Alternate Events: Zatch and Zeno!
by innovator1
Summary: What would happen if Zeno did find Zatch in the mamodo world before the battle for king took place? well it will happen here in this story. Zeno finds the intel he was trying to find, his younger brothers address. How will this turn out? R&R
1. Chapter 1

Alternate events! Zatch and Zeno!

Chapter 1 "Don't judge a book by its cover"

Authors note: I had this idea when I just woke up and thought nothing of it…then I thought this could be a great epic tail, mostly in the child years though.

A four year old boy was sitting in a tree which over looked a river. The boy had a white cloak with a broach that had a bluish hue, he was wearing white shoes; he had purple eyes, and silver hair, two lines running down each eye, his skin was as pale as snow. His name was Zeno.

Zeno's pov

"What a fool, he can't even tell that I'm watching him" Zeno mocked as he was a blond hair boy swim around in the river.

"I caught it!" the boy shouted happily as he caught a giant fish and dragged it back to shore.

For the most part the boy looked a lot like Zeno, but he had blond hair, one line running down from each eye, his eyes were light orange, a blue cloak and blue shoes was laid out on the ground…so the boy was actually naked, he had tanned skin, but it showed a bruise to his left ribs, it was the size of a adults hand.

Zeno didn't really care about that at all, for when he gazed upon the boy all he wanted to do is fry him.

"How easy it would be to simply make him suffer as I have suffered" Zeno said with a evil smile

Zatch began happily eating his large fish to himself not realizing that someone was watching him

"Look at him, without a care in the world. How can someone like him possibly deserve Baou?" Zeno growled to himself as he slowly started to aim at the child below him

Zeno took aim and was about to launch a spell but stopped, not out of fear of what would happen, not out of future regret, and not because he had any doubts.

Flashback of Zeno's

Zeno was training inside the palace with his private instructor once again, and again he was being pushed way past his limits.

"Zakerga!" Zeno shouted

Zeno unleashed a massive condense form of lightning at his instructor

The instructor countered by summoning a large shield that connected to his arm, putting the shield at a tilt, the instructor was able to deflect the spell and send it spiraling into the ceiling.

"Damn it!" Zeno shouted as he summoned a large lightning yo-yo and sent it at his instructor with the intent to kill

"All forces in the universe feel my wrath" The instructor called out as he tapped on his spear

The instructor summoned a large spear that spun at an insane speed making it look more like a drill

The two spells collided and cancelled each other out

Zeno dropped to his knees exhausted

"This was your 5 battle today Zeno, you're getting stronger" The instructor stated as he walked up to the boy

"…why…is it…that…you…are last person….I fight every day?" Zeno asked

"Why? Well today the first person you fought had to have medical care that's why" The instructor explained

Zeno laughed a little

"My prince, tomorrow will be your birthday, so what do you have planned this time?" The instructor asked

Zeno looked up to his instructor and smiled a little. "What else would there be for me? All I want is either Baou or a two week vacation from all of this" Zeno explained

"Last time you asked about your brother it didn't go well for you, and you lost your birthday privileges" the instructor responded

"I won't ask father about Zatch anymore, but that won't stop me from finding him" Zeno said bluntly

Zeno got up and started to walk out of the training hall

"My prince, what should I get you?" The instructor asked

Zeno turned around "Tell me where my fool of a brother is at, that's all I want from you" Zeno stated

"You know I can't do that" the instructor responded

"Then don't come to my birthday party" Zeno shouted then walked away

"My lord! That's unfair!" The instructor responded while waving his arms about

"You think I care?" Zeno retorted

One day later, Zeno's fourth birthday party

The party was being taken place inside the throne room where there was a large table with all sorts of food laid out

But being a kids party there was absolutely no kids running around

The only child at the party was Zeno, the rest of the group was a bunch of adults in fashionable uniforms

There were about 50 of them all talking to each other, having conversations about the mamodo world and most importantly business and further advancement in ranks.

No presents were laid out on the table for the birthday boy; there was a huge cake but no song of "Happy Birthday". The cake didn't even address who it was for.

There was a band playing a song that you would usually hear for a slow kind of dancing.

Even Zeno himself was forced to wear a tuxedo, the bow on Zeno neck felt so tight that it was choking him.

This was a party yes, but it was a party for the grownups, to be here at the party only meant one of the greatest of honors since you could further your career, to be left out you were a fool. The richest of mamodo came here on this day.

Some people would greet the birthday boy, wish him the best of luck and what not, but not to make Zeno happy, it was to impress the king who was sitting in his throne watching Zeno silently

Zeno was sitting in a chair just silently eating, there was nothing else to do honestly.

"Damn it, this is so boring" Zeno said to himself silently as he ate some of "his" cake.

"Zeno" A voice called out which was right behind him

_(Great another rich mamodo who wants to impress my father…what should I do? Grin or smile? It would be easier just to say piss off)_ Zeno thought to himself as he turned around to see his instructor.

"My lord, you're stuffing yourself already?" the instructor mocked

"I told you not to come here, I can get the guards to kick you out you know" Zeno threatened

"I have a present for you though" the instructor responded

Zeno's eyes lit up but he didn't want to give in…Zeno looked at the throne room's table which had nothing but food for him and guests, nothing that he could unwrap.

Zeno sighed "Fine you can stay" Zeno surrendered

The instructor started to walk away and head toward the door

"HEY I said you can stay!" Zeno yelled out, Zeno still wanted that present.

"Not here you fool" The instructor responded and walked out into a hall way where the thick wood doors would separate them from the rest of the party

Zeno followed his instructor outside into the hallway

"You better have a good reason for making me look like a fool" Zeno demanded

"Well it's not like I could be left out, so I did what you asked of me" the instructor explained

Zeno's eyes widened

"…y…You didn't" Zeno halfway mumbled

"I can lose my job over this Zeno, but then again I can get a pay raise…but first you must promise me something" The instructor demanded

"Promise? Hell I can just take it from you" Zeno retorted with a smile

The instructor took out a sealed envelop "I can just burn this Zeno without a seconds thought" the instructor responded

Zeno froze knowing that his instructor wasn't bluffing

"Fine" Zeno gave in again

It was hard for Zeno not having a single card he could pull out on the table.

"When you do find Zatch promise me that you won't out right attack him, give it a couple days…no this entire vacation of yours to see who Zatch really is" The instructor demanded

"How do you know that I won't just break this promise?" Zeno responded

"Because then I will make your life more hell then it already is, and I can keep an eye on you, remember us adults have our ways Zeno" The instructor warned

"And after these two weeks?" Zeno asked

"If you still dislike him, do whatever you please" the instructor responded and gave Zeno his present

Zeno snatched the envelop and opened what was inside his brother's address, what school he went too, even some of the locations were Zatch would normally play at, and surprisingly his favorite fishing spot.

Zeno had a large smile on his face, one that you really couldn't tell if it was for evil intentions or just he finally got what he wished for so maybe he was happy?

"Fine, I'll keep this promise" Zeno said with his smile still not disappearing from his face.

Zeno put the envelop into his pocket

"Now all I need is that vacation" Zeno said with a determined look

After the party Zeno was able to convince his father to give him a 2 week vacation.

"Thank you father" Zeno said with a bow, Zeno then stood back up and walked away determined to find out the reason why Baou was given to his younger brother.

End of flashback

"The only reason you're alive Zatch is because of my instructor's wishes" Zeno said to himself as he lowered his hand, but he still kept an eye on his brother wondering why Baou would ever be given to a child that couldn't even sense a mamodo's presence.


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2: A Flower?

Authors note: Hmm, I'm still trying to figure out how this will all turn out during the battle for king. Should I keep those two close, or separate? Heck will there be a Zatch Bell to even worry about?

One day later, 2nd day of Zeno's vacation

Zeno was spying on Zatch once again, hiding in a tree which had a good view of the landscape.

Zatch was playing around in the grass field…by himself

"I'm going to get you!" Zatch yelled then jumped

A frog jumped out of the grass and dodged Zatch again

"He's been at this for an hour already…and he's caught then released that stupid animal so many times I've lost count" Zeno said while bored out of his mind.

Zeno looked over and seen a small clear orb hovering next to him

"So that's how you spy on me?" Zeno asked as he looked at the floating orb which was the size of Zeno's hand. "What do you want instructor?" Zeno asked the orb

…

…

…

"So all you can do is listen and see?" Zeno said with a small grin. "Fine then" Zeno responded and started making funny facial features at the orb trying to entertain himself

Meanwhile somewhere inside the castle

The instructor was looking at a larger orb which showed Zeno making fun of the orb.

"Well…he is still just a child" the instructor said to himself

…

Back with Zeno spying on Zatch

"Take this, and this and this" Zeno quietly said to himself as he smashed the orb against the tree. "Damn this thing won't break for nothing…probably shouldn't use a spell or I might be found" Zeno said as he held the orb in his right hand. Zeno stared back at the grass land where Zatch was playing.

"Get this one too" A childish voice called out.

Both Zatch and Zeno looked over to see two boys running around stomping on a bunch of flowers for the fun of it.

"I got this one" Another child said as he stomped on one of the few flowers in the grass field.

Zatch left the frog alone and headed toward the two boys.

"Crush this one too" The kid said as he was about to stomp on another flower

"STOP" Zatch yelled out and blocked the kid's path

"Oh it's you, get out of our way" The older kid responded

The other child joined in and stood beside his friend

"No you shouldn't do these things" Zatch tried to explain

"See if I care" The older kid responded

"Get out of our way or we'll stomp on you" the other kid stated

Zeno was still lying on a tree branch observing what was going on.

"Is he standing up for a flower?" Zeno mumbled to himself

"Nuu, I won't let you" Zatch stated as he used his body to protect the small flower

"Move it" The older child shouted and started kicking Zatch

"No" Zatch responded but barely reacted when the kid's foot impacted Zatch's ribs.

The other kid joined in too and started kicking Zatch in the head

Zatch used his arms to protect his head, but used his body to protect nothing but the flower.

Zeno started to laugh but tried to keep it in for nobody would notice him

"What…an idiot… getting beat up for…a flower" Zeno laughed to himself. "What a weakling" Zeno stated

A few minutes passed with the kids constantly kicking Zatch

Zeno stopped laughing and his smile soon turned into a frown

"Why doesn't he defend himself? Why doesn't he use a spell?" Zeno asked himself with a annoyed tone

"Damn it Zatch MOVE ALREADY" the boys shouted

"…" Zatch didn't respond

The boys kept on kicking Zatch relentlessly

Zeno's hand gripped the bark of the tree and tore it off with ease

"Damn it!" Zeno shouted in anger but then covered his mouth.

Nobody seemed to notice the sudden outburst of noise

"Why? Why is that he was given Baou? He wants to protect a stupid flower yet he can't even protect himself" Zeno stated with an obvious tone of anger.

The beating went on for even longer then Zeno thought or even worse it felt even longer for Zatch.

"Damn It, Damn it! He's a disgrace to our name" Zeno yelled to himself as he started to overflow with anger. "Use a spell damn it, this pathetic weakling cannot possibly be my brother, there's no way theirs blood between us" Zeno growled

The need to unleash a spell at not only Zatch but the boys beating Zatch up felt so great that Zeno's body started to create a few lightning sparks.

"I'll fry them all, Zatch for disgracing our name and Stealing Baou. And those two idiots who are dragging the BELL name through the mud" Zeno stated and stood up on the branch ready to fire a spell until the clear orb spying on him smashed straight in his face.

Zeno nearly fell over but caught himself and sat back down.

"You son of a…" Zeno was interrupted by a girl with red hair, and a red dress came running at the boys shouting and wielding a large stick.

"How about I crush YOU!" The girl shouted with a scary face while trying to swing the large stick at the kids except for Zatch

"Shit runaway It's crazy red headed Tia!" the kid shouted and ran, his friend followed.

Zatch looked up to see Tia

"Unu Thanks Tia" Zatch said happily, almost as if nothing happened

"Look at that fool, able to smile right after being beaten up, what with him?" Zeno said in a confused manner. Somehow no one still didn't notice Zeno hiding in the tree, even if the leaves were hiding him he still did make a lot of noise while Zatch was being beaten.

"Zatch, you have to stand up for yourself more often, I won't come saving you because it'll ruin my rep" Tia tried to explain.

Tia looked at Zatch who didn't really look that bad, a few bruises here and there but that was about it.

"Why were those kids beating on you?" Tia wondered

"I wouldn't let them crush this flower" Zatch said as he got up and showed a perfectly fine small flower.

"A flower?" Tia responded

"Yeah that's what I thought" Zeno said to himself

"Flowers are defenseless so someone has to protect them" Zatch tried to explain

"Those kinds of flowers grow back idiot" Zeno responded silently

"Just try to follow my advice, stop acting like a wimp and you won't get bullied so often" Tia explained then walked away

"Thanks Tia!" Zatch thanked again

Zatch looked at the flower one last time before leaving, but he didn't head In the direction of his home.

Zeno stopped spying on Zatch for the day and waited for him to leave.

When Zatch was out of sight, Zeno jumped down off the tree and walked to the flower Zatch tried so hard to protect.

"It's a stupid flower" Zeno stated as he plucked the flower out of the ground. "I don't get it….then again do I need to? Not even that girl really understood why Zatch did it" Zeno said as he twirled the flower in his hands. "It only proves he's a thieving fool" Zeno said as he burned the flower into ashes with his lightning.

Zeno then teleported back to the palace where his instructor waited to scold him.

"Zeno! Are you trying to piss me off?" The instructor shouted at Zeno

Zeno glanced at his instructor but didn't say anything.

"You came close to trying to kill your brother AGAIN! Two days in a row, maybe I should just call this thing off" The instructor stated

"What do you mean?" Zeno asked

"If The king finds out that I knew you found Zatch he would have my job, if he finds out that I let you kill him for no good reason he would have my head damn it" the instructor explained

"That's not what I mean you fool, how will YOU call this off?" Zeno asked

"I'd rather tell the king what happened, that way I still have a chance at living" the instructor responded

Zeno laughed a little

"So how's that pay raise you got helping you now?" Zeno laughed

"Just remember what I said, if you break our deal I will make your life hell for as long as I can" the Instructor warned

"It's already hell, nothing different about that" Zeno waved his instructor off before heading to his room.

"Zeno, did you learn anything about Zatch?" The instructor asked

"You saw it too didn't you? He's a wimp, a coward and has no pride. Hell his family probably babied him too much, that's why he turned out like that" Zeno explained

_(So that's how you view it huh? Zeno still doesn't get it) _the instructor thought.

"Good night my lord" The instructor said before Zeno entered and locked his room.


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3 Zatch's school

Important Authors note: The school in this story is the same as the one I explained in the "The Race" (My other story) so if you don't really get what the setting looks like, then check out "Chapter 12 School, The Race", it'll make everything easier for you and me.

It was the third day of Zeno's vacation, and Zatch's weekend was over so he had to go back to school.

Zeno was lying on the roof of the school, the building, but because it was slightly slanted it gave him a decent view of Zatch's class room.

School had just started only 20 minutes ago so the air was still crisp and it was only around 7am.

Zeno would just stare into the clear blue sky then glance back at Zatch who was actually sleeping soundly.

"No wonder why he's an idiot, he sleeps all day…then again class is pretty boring…" Zeno stated but observed the class teacher's actions toward Zatch.

Zeno found it very odd and slightly disturbing

For one the teacher wouldn't even try to wake Zatch from his slumber, even when she walked by him.

Second was that she would hand out worksheets to everyone including Zatch who would of course have no idea what it was when he woke up.

Third was that she would whisper into his ear about something, and Zatch would slowly nod his head in confirmation of something.

But the most disturbing was whenever another kid did the same thing as Zatch, the teacher would awaken the child from their slumber, yet still leave Zatch alone.

Zeno of course just thought it was favoritism and disliked it

"Must be a teacher's pet" Zeno mocked

Zeno kept on trying to pay attention to the class for about 10 minutes until boredom over took him and he too fell asleep

About 2 hours past until Zatch woke up to find that the teacher was teaching something else

The ringing of the bell also made Zeno wake up

"Damn…what happened?" Zeno said as he sat back up to see Zatch actually trying to participate in class. "How long was I asleep?" Zeno asked himself then looked at the shadow of the school to see how much it had changed. "Around 2 hours" Zeno said slightly in a daze, still trying to wake himself up from his nap.

Zeno forced himself to stay awake and watch Zatch for around another 2 hours

Zatch pretty much stayed focus on the teachers lectures

"Why is this SOOOO boring!" Zeno shouted out of boredom and decided to follow Zatch after school ended for him. "I got two hours to mess around" Zeno sighed and jumped off the roof to gently land on the ground.

Zeno begun walking around the school campus watching the other kids play and talk with each other. Everything seemed pretty normal.

Zeno took another look stare at the scenery of the school, how big it was, the stain glass which decorated it and the occasional spell being unleashed yet not somehow not causing any damage.

Zeno sat down on the grass which was next to the sidewalk and tried to think of what fun there was to do without blowing his cover…until something started hitting his head from behind…

"You think you hide by wearing that disguise?" A voice called out and wacked a stick against Zeno's head multiple times.

(What the HELL? I got two choices…either kill the person who's hitting me upside my head, or run and NOT blow my cover) Zeno thought to himself as the constant knocking on is head started to make his blood boil.

"You're not going to cry? Or are you going to run and cry at the same time?" a voice laughed

The person behind Zeno then grabbed Zeno's silver hair and yanked it back. "What is this? A wig?" the voice asked

Zeno looked back at his aggressor with death stare

Zeno's blood was boiling and he was pretty sure a vein had popped in his forehead from frustration.

Zeno got a good look at the person behind him, It was a boy around 4 years older than Zeno, he had a round steel helmet and looked like a cyborg, his name was Robnos…that's what it read on his book bag.

"You even put on makeup, so you're a girl now to…" Robnos started to choke because Zeno latched his hands around his throat.

"I'm going to freaking KILL YOU!" Zeno shouted in anger

Zeno was then grabbed from behind from a duplicate of the same person in front of him

"A clone?" Zeno responded but then felt a punch to his stomach

"Learn your place Zatch" Robnos responded

Zeno glared at Robnos, his purple eyes nearly went blank with anger

"You dare compare me to HIM!" Zeno screamed as he lifted the second Robnos off his feet and threw him as hard as he possibly could at the first, which sent the two spiraling into the forest

The two were like a cannon ball which plowed through 4-5 trees

"W…what the heck?" the two Robnos's responded

"Looks like no one is around except for you and me" Zeno growled as he walked toward the two

"Zat…" The second Robnos was interrupted as Zeno dashed at them at high speed and met him face to face.

"My name is not Zatch" Zeno stated calmly as he placed his hand on the second Robnos's face

A large electric impulse started to circulate throughout the second Robnos's body, the second Robnos in response screamed in pain.

"Im…Impossible!" The first Robnos shouted

Zeno picked up one of the large tree's that had been snapped in half

As the second Robnos fell to the floor

"How about I hit you with this stick?" Zeno asked with a grin

"NOT a chance!" Robnos shouted as he started to glow and the second Robnos joined into his body making him 2x larger.

"That's it?" Zeno mocked as he put the tree back down

"Take this!" Robnos shouted and shot a strong straight laser out of his eye

Zeno simply sidestepped a few feet and dodged the spell

"Zaker" Zeno responded and aimed at Robnos

The large uncontrolled form of blue lightning came out of Zeno's right hand and engulfed Robnos

Robnos fell to the ground in pain

"Shit….shit…who are you?" Robnos asked

"Someone who doesn't like to be hit with a stick" Zeno stated as he picked the tree back up and hit Robnos with it like a baseball bat

Robnos went flying another 100 feet before he landed back down to earth

"Homerun!" Zeno yelled with a smile. "Well that wasted about an hour…now what?" Zeno said as he looked around. Zeno brushed off his hair which had a few wood chips in his hair because of Robnos hitting him upside the head with a stick.

"Why was that idiot hitting me over the head with a stick to begin with? Even if he thought I was Zatch" Zeno wondered. Zeno rubbed his face for a second and looked at his hand "I'm not wearing makeup, what an idiot" Zeno stated

The school bell rung again and it meant it was lunch time for Zatch's class

_(Should I spy on "him" again? No it's on the first floor and I don't have any place to hide)_ Zeno thought. Then Zeno's stomach growled, "Then again, spying on someone does make you hungry" Zeno said as he put his hand to his stomach.

Zeno walked up to the entrance of the school and tried to think of a plan

"Should I raid the pantry and just steal? Or just take someone's lunch? Maybe I should put on a different outfit too?" Zeno said to himself as he molded his cloak to look more like a suit.

Now with a white tuxedo, Zeno walked into Zatch's school.

A couple kids looked at Zeno

"Who's the new kid?" One kid asked

"Is that Zatch?" one kid whispered to another still unsure

"No he has two lines on his face…" the other kid responded

Zeno looked around to see where the cafeteria was at but didn't really have any clue.

Zeno glanced at a kid who was staring at him and decided to walk up to him

"Where's the cafeteria?" Zeno demanded

"So you're a new kid?" The kid responded.

"I don't plan on staying here long" Zeno responded

"Well then find it by yourself" The kid remarked

Zeno grabbed the child by his shirt and lifted him off the ground as high as he could, being his arm wasn't very long.

"Don't make me shove you into a locker" Zeno stated

The kid gulped, and the other students in the hall way gasped and backed away

"Wow, on the first day he's already picking a fight" a girl said a little surprised

"Defiantly NOT Zatch" One older child responded

"Alright fine, fine, it's down the hall take a right and go straight, then you'll be able to see it" the kid explained

Zeno let the kid go and started to walk down the hall not really caring if people mistook him for Zatch Bell…then again he wanted to make it obvious that he wasn't Zatch.

Reaching the cafeteria Zeno seen at least 300 kids either in line or already eating, Zeno gave the area a good look before he finally spotted Zatch eating at a table by himself.

Zatch didn't seem too sad, he was trying to enjoy his meal which looked like a giant apple, two pints of milk, and of course yellow tail.

There was a boy with a duck bill wearing pajamas trying to sit with the other kids but they wouldn't let him.

Zeno pulled some money out of his pocket and wondered if he just buy a lunch and try not to make a scene…well today was NOT Zeno's lucky day

A big kid around 5 years older than Zeno noticed that he had pulled money out and decided to confront him about it.

"Hand it over" the older child responded while holding out his right hand.

Zeno glared at the kid _(What the hell is with this school? First people beat me upside the head with a stick, then they don't want to give directions, THEN THEY TRY TO ROB ME!) _Zeno thought to himself. Zeno came up with a quick and easy plan.

Zeno grabbed the kids right thumb and quickly dislocated then threw him onto the floor with in a split second

"I don't give handouts to strangers" Zeno stated with a grin as the child laid on the ground in pain as he tried to put relocate his thumb

It was done so fast that the teachers didn't even see what the four year old boy wearing a white tuxedo did.

"My hand, my hand" the boy cried out as one teacher went to see what was wrong with him.

Zeno made a quick getaway and headed for the lunch line

The menu was

Yellow tail

Pasta

Sandwiches

And today's special- Swordfish

After waiting 10 minutes patently in line it was finally Zeno's turn to pay for his meal

Zeno got the Swordfish, a mamodo size orange, and two pints of milk

"Haven't seen you around, new?" the staff worker asked

"Umm, yea I guess you could say that" Zeno responded while shrugging his shoulders. "Here" Zeno said as he gave the coins to the staff worker and went to find a seat to where he could eat while not being seen by Zatch.

By some miracle Zatch had not noticed Zeno standing in line, then again he was already done eating, and wasn't really doing anything.

Zeno chose an open table where nobody was sitting and it was three rows behind Zatch

Zeno took his seat but quickly another child sat down with him.

Zeno glanced at the child to see it was the boy with a duck bill

"Hiya I'm Kanchomé" Kanchomé introduced himself while sitting directly in front of Zeno, which blocked Zeno's sight of Zatch

Zeno tried to ignore the boy and eat his lunch peacefully

"So you're new right? You want me to show you around?" Kanchomé asked

"Shut up" Zeno responded

"What's your name? wait, what level are you in? are you going to be in the same class as me?" Kanchomé kept on asking questions that either annoyed Zeno, or questions that he couldn't tell him anyways.

Zeno looked at Kanchomé with a slightly confused look

"Why are you still talking?" Zeno asked

Kanchomé didn't pay attention and still kept on talking

"You know the best kind of chocolates are…" Kanchome still kept on talking about the school and candy

(He's still talking, now what should I do?) Zeno asked himself as he forced himself to remain calm.

Kanchomé gave Zeno a long stare for a moment and remained silent

…

…

Zeno found his sudden silent stare a little disturbing

"Listen I'm losing my appetite because of you, so leave" Zeno demanded while opening a carton of milk

"You look a lot like Zatch" Kanchomé blurted out while pointing to Zeno's face

Instantly Zeno crushed his milk causing a volcano like explosion to erupt out of the top of opening on the carton, as milk poured onto Zeno's and Kanchomé's head

"So…you know Zatch…" Zeno mumbled

"Well he's a lot like me, people tend to pick on us a lot, and they view us as lower class…" Kanchomé tried to explain.

Zeno didn't really care about what Kanchomé had to say

"So he basically doesn't have friends. Who cares, I lived without my peers my entire life" Zeno responded in an slightly aggressive tone. "That doesn't give you pathetic losers the reason to be such WEAKLINGS!" Zeno shouted

Zatch lifted his head up off the table and looked behind him to see Kanchomé talking to a kid, but since Kanchomé was directly in front of Zeno; Zatch couldn't get a good view of who he was talking to…

"I'…I'm….I'm not weak!" Kanchomé tried to counter

"Oh? You put yourself on the same playing field as Zatch, I watched as the other kids refused to let you sit down." Zeno stated. "If it were me, I would've pulled up a chair and kick everyone off of that table and tell them to FIND A NEW SPOT!" Zeno explained

"Like I could do that, Brago sits there too!" Kanchomé pointed out. "And don…don't act so tough…You're the new kid, you're the same as me and Zatch…" Kanchomé was interrupted by Zeno shoving an orange into his mouth.

"I'm NOT the same, your weak, I'm not, and it's that simple" Zeno stated with a menacing glare

"Kanchomé you ok?" Zatch called out

Zeno now realized that Zatch was looking at him and Kanchomé, the only thing saving him was using the duck boy as a means to block Zatch's view

"You don't know me, you've never seen me, and most of all don't talk to Zatch about me." Zeno explained while giving Kanchomé a serious look. "And if you do, I'll kill you" Zeno said with a tone of actually meaning what he said.

Kanchomé couldn't talk back because he still hand a huge orange in his mouth, all he could do was shake his head up and down.

Zatch got up and was about to start walking over to see if his friend was alright.

Within a split second Zeno flipped the entire table over which nearly fell atop on Kanchomé…

But for some reason Zeno pushed him out of the way with his cloak.

Zeno was now hiding behind a table trying to think of a getaway plan without being seen by his younger brother Zatch Bell.

Zeno picked the remaining pieces of food he had from his lunch and a smile grew across his face.

"FOOD FIGHT!" Zeno shouted as he chucked a large piece of sword fish into Brago's face

Everyone gasped in horror to how the hell the new kid could even think of doing something like that

Brago stood up and was about to unleash a spell until another round of milk hit dead square in the face by none other than Zeno who was still hiding behind the table

Zatch and Kanchomé looked terrified and started running away from the impending doom which was soon about to come to the school's cafeteria

Brago gave Zeno a death glare and aimed his hand at him until pasta started to fly around the room because the kid was hit in the face the last remaining bits of Zeno's yellow tail

"I'm GOING TO KILL YOU ALL!" Brago shouted as he started firing dark energy balls across the cafeteria

"Huh, so he is pretty strong" Zeno said as he teleported away without anyone noticing because they were too busy running for their lives

Zeno teleported back to the palace and was met with his instructor waiting for him

"Really Zeno? Do you have to cause trouble every time?" the instructor asked

"Huh? What you talking about, they started it, I was…good" Zeno tried to pretend

"Ha good? I've been watching you ya know" the instructor responded

"That's perverted" Zeno laughed as he walked into his room

"… just remember" the instructor was cut off

"Yeah, yeah, don't kill Zatch" Zen explained

"And what if that "Brago" Kills him?" the instructor asked

"Then he'll be doing me a FAVOR!" Zeno mocked, Zeno then closed his door ending the conversation

Meanwhile back with Zatch

"NOO! The cafeteria is GONE!" Zatch cried as he looked at a crater

"Well we can always go home and eat" Kanchomé responded

Zatch gulped a little and looked down at the ground. "I'll just catch my food" Zatch stated with a frown

"Look on the Brightside, Brago was suspended" Kanchomé said with a smile

"But…my yellowtail" Zatch whimpered

"That's your favorite, but they only have it on Mondays" Kanchomé stated

"Yellowtail…" Zatch mumbled

"Hey! Just because the school cafeteria is gone doesn't mean you kids can skip class" the teacher yelled and instructed the rest of the students to go back to class.


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 4 Zatch's social life

Authors note: is this getting repetitive? Zeno spying on Zatch's life…Yeah I know it's weird but it's not out of Zeno's nature, In England Zeno spied on Zatch, and Zatch and Kiyo had no idea Zeno was doing it. Don't worry though it won't stay this way forever, Zeno does only have 10 days left to make a choice about Zatch ya know…until then (and maybe after too) I'm going to adhere to the child side of Zeno after all he is still only 4 years old.

Thanks to the rampage of the mighty Brago, the entire school had to close the day after because of a gas leak and the kids were given the day off.

5 AM and Zatch was awake

Zatch woke up in his little torn up bed and he only had one small pillow and blanket that had a couple of holes inside.

The sun wasn't even up yet. Zatch gave a quick glance at his surroundings making sure that he was alone. The room was dark, so dark that you couldn't really see anything, but there was nothing to see, no dressers, some cloths stacked in a neat pile near the corner of the wall, no toys, a book bag that was beside Zatch at all times, Zatch even had a small amount of coins hidden inside his room, he had two windows but one of them had been boarded up with wood.

Giving a sigh in relief "She's not awake yet" Zatch said with a small smile. "Unu, today is going to be a good day" Zatch whispered to himself as he silently got dressed and got out of his house as quickly as possible.

Zatch headed down the road to his favorite fishing spot to go get breakfast.

Meanwhile with Zeno still sleeping in his large bed

"Zeno get up" his instructor demanded

"Uhh…5 more minutes" Zeno begged and covered himself up in his large white and purple blankets

"You gave me an order, and that was to wake you up when Zatch got up" The instructor explained

"wh..what time is it?" Zeno asked with his eyes still closed

"5 AM" The instructor responded

"Leave me alone….too early" Zeno mumbled

The instructor pulled the blankets off of Zeno and put them on the floor. Zeno was wearing a t-shirt and boxers.

"You told me to wake you up, so I will" the instructor stated

"I order you to leave me alone" Zeno said as he plunged his face into his fluffy pillows.

"Nice try, but you told me not to listen to you when you just woke up" The instructor said as he picked up a bucket of water basically out of nowhere.

"What idiot would tell you that?" Zeno asked

"You also told me that I could wake you up by any means" The instructor said with a smile as he splashed Zeno with a bucket of cold water

"AHHHH what the HELL!" Zeno shouted as he jumped off his bed, Zeno got up soak and wet.

"Ah now you're up, go down stairs breakfast is ready" the instructor said as he walked out of Zeno's room

"WHY DO YOU THINK I LOCK ROOM!" Zeno pouted as he got ready for the day.

The instructor laughed as he ventured downstairs

_(Damn it…why the heck is my brother up at this time anyways?)_ Zeno wondered as he put his white cloak on, and quickly brushed down his hair.

Zeno headed out of his room to see that his instructor didn't head far down the stairs and was still waiting for him.

"So how did you find out that my brother woke up anyhow?" Zeno asked

"I used a magical trip wire that is activated by Zatch's certain weight, it's right outside Zatch's house, and it's also invisible so Zatch wouldn't know about it. It's not like I'm going to stay up all night waiting for him to wake up and use my orb" the Instructor explained

"Trip wire? Hmm interesting, you have to teach me that trick someday" Zeno responded as he headed down stairs.

After heading downstairs…

Zeno ate his mamodo sized breakfast in the large dining room and head off to see what his younger brother was up too.

"Last time I seen him he was at the Gorge river, his favorite fishing spot" The instructor explained

"Got it, where I first seen him" Zeno stated as he used his cloak to teleport to Zatch's location.

Zeno teleported into the same tree as last time

It was still dark outside and all you could hear was the splashing of someone in the river.

"Again with the same spot" Zeno said as he hid in the same tree which over looked Zatch swimming around in the river chasing a medium size fish.

Zatch swam quickly through the water and caught a fish the same size as him.

"Hmm, the only thing is fishing" Zeno said to himself as he laid back on the large branch and accidently fell asleep.

Zatch thought he had heard something out of the darkness but he didn't seem to care. Zatch carried his fish to the shoreline and started to happily eat his raw fish mamodo style.

6 AM

The sun started to break to somewhat break through the horizon but it was still dark and quite outside.

"Unu time to see Ponygon" Zatch stated happily, he then set out to walk to Ponygon's house.

The instructor's orb in response smashed Zeno in the head causing him to wake up.

"Can't you find more nicer way of waking someone up" Zeno growled as he rubbed his head then looked down below him to see Zatch missing,

Zeno looked up the road to see a small dark figure walking away

"And where are you going Zatch?" Zeno asked

…

About 10 minutes passed until Zatch finally reached his destination

"Ponygon!" Zatch yelled as he knocked on Ponygon's house

"He's always up so early" one voice said

"He's is always energetic, Well I'll get the door" a women's voice said

Zatch waited patiently until Ponygon's mother opened up the front door.

"Good morning Ponygon's mom" Zatch greeted

Ponygon's mother was a standing upright brown haired horse wearing an apron

"Sorry Zatch but Ponygon is still sleeping" Ponygon's mother responded

Zatch whined a little and was about to walk away.

"Hey Zatch, it's still a little chilly out. Why not come inside?" Ponygon's father asked while drinking a cup of coffee.

"Come on Zatch, we still haven't given you your birthday present" Ponygon's mother stated and she nudged Zatch into the house

"Really! I got a present?" Zatch asked excitedly

Zeno tried to get close as possible to the house and hid his aura for he wouldn't be detected. Spying through a window, Zeno could easily hear their conversation. "That duck boy is a bad lair, Zatch has friends" Zeno stated

The mother went to go get Zatch's present

Meanwhile Zatch looked around the house; it wasn't unfamiliar to him since it wasn't the first time being inside. There was a square wood table that Ponygon's father was sitting at, wood counter, appliances which were customized for a horses hoof, life the coffee maker and mugs.

Ponygon's father was wearing a neat suit and looked ready for work.

"Sorry Zatch It's a bit late, I hope you like it, we all picked it out including Ponygon" Ponygon's father explained as his wife came inside the kitchen and handed Zatch a blue wrapped gift which was the shape of a box.

"Thank yo…" Zatch was interrupted by Ponygon's father putting his hoof up to Zatch's mouth.

"Shh, Ponygon is still sleeping" Ponygon's father responded

"Umm…should I wait for him to wake up before I open it?" Zatch asked

"No, it'll be fine, just show him it later on today" Ponygon's father explained quietly

Zatch jumped onto the table and begun unwrapping his birthday gift, which showed a red metal bottle container with engravings on it, and two mamodo symbols on it, and it also had a steel hook that could clip to a part of Zatch's cloak.

"I noticed that you're the type to stay outside for long periods of time, So we decided to get you a magic imbued container which purifies any liquid you put in there, and whatever temperature you wish it too be, hot or cold, it'll come out the way you want it" Ponygon's father explained

Zatch smiled "Thank you very much, it's the best gift ever" Zatch responded

Ponygon's parents smiled but they thought it was a little over exaggerated

"Glad you like it, we put our engravings in it too" Ponygon's mother pointed out

Zatch read the engravings

**From Ponygon, Ponygon's mother, Ponygon's father to Zatch who saved our family **

"Unu I'll keep it with me always" Zatch stated as he hook his present to his cloak

"It's been a couple of months since that incident happened Zatch, thanks to you Ponygon's heart has been opened up to other humanoid mamodo, and plus I'm still here because of you" Ponygon's father explained while finishing up his coffee.

A pretty big smile grew across the young boy's face

As the three talked about school or just random things that Zatch wanted to talk about

"So he saved someone's life huh? Strange, isn't he too wimpy to the point that he can't even protect himself?" Zeno laughed a little bit and stopped and thought about what Zatch had to do in order to save that person's life.

7 AM

About an hour passed and Zatch stayed comfortably inside until the sun finally raised, this illuminated the sky.

"Have a nice day Zatch" Ponygon's mother waved off

Ponygon's father had already left for work

"Unu you too!" Zatch waved off, Zatch left Ponygon's house with his container which was filled with milk.

"Finally" Zeno grumbled as he got up and followed Zatch from a good distance away

Ponygon's mother noticed this finally and thought she was looking at Zatch again.

"Zatch never mentioned that he had a brother" Ponygon's mother stated while looking out her window

Zatch had walked back near the school, where there was a large play ground with some kids playing around, considering it was still pretty early in the day.

"What with him? Normal kids are either sleeping still or just waking up" Zeno complained as he wished he were still sleeping.

Out of the children playing outside was Tia, Koruru, and Sugino, a couple other kids around a few years older than Zatch.

Zeno looked around to see a good hiding spot and found it, for some reason there was a very tall lookout tower with a missing latter…well it was missing because the parents didn't want their kids to be 100 feet in the air so they ripped off the only way to get up there.

"That'll work" Zeno said as he waited for Zatch to go into the playground

Zeno made then made a mad dash up the tower while using his cloak to propel him up the tower almost effortlessly

"Why would someone build something like this anyways?" Zeno wondered as he took a look around the small outpost

It was pretty small, only big enough to fit maybe 2 kids; the outpost was built out of wood though and would sway in the air.

Zeno stared at Zatch trying to play with the other kids, which seemed hesitant at first.

"This is starting to bore me" Zeno said annoyed as he pulled out a decent size book, about 300 pages long.

A few minutes later Zeno heard an explosion from below and decided to check it out.

The mamodo children were casting spells and taking turns at a large boulder.

Zeno looked at Zatch waiting for his turn.

"You're up Zatch" a few kids laughed

Zatch slowly walked up and stared at the boulder

Zatch opened his mouth and a yellowish glow started to form in his mouth, his eyes rolled into the back of his head.

A small erratic yellow lightning bolt came out of Zatch's mouth which simply grazed the boulder doing hardly any damage. Zatch then passed out then fell to the floor.

All of the kids started laughing at Zatch, Zatch slowly regain consciousness and sat back upright.

"Ha he can't even use a spell without passing out!" one kid laughed

"What a loser" another kid mocked

"Simply pathetic" Sugino remarked

Zeno observed the situation and nearly bit his tongue off from anger.

"HE CAN'T EVEN USE A SPELL!" Zeno shouted in disbelief

A few kids noticed the sudden up roar and looked at the tower

Zeno quickly used both of his hands to shut himself up as he banged his head against the wall.

(WHY THE HELL! Would someone that weak be given Baou? Damn it, damn it, he doesn't even deserve the other 50% of Father's powers!) Zeno thought as he tried to remain calm or he risked burning the tower down from unleashing random lightning sparks.

"Why would we be with someone like you?" a kid asked

Zatch looked around as he was being taunted by at least 5 different kids, all of which who were older then he was.

Tia stood in the back waiting for what Zatch usually does runaway and cry somewhere…but he didn't today for some reason

"What you looking at?" One kid shouted at Zatch

_(Today…today is going to be a good day, a good day, I won't let them ruin it)_ Zatch thought to himself.

Zatch turned around and started to walk away trying not to provoke the kids from either teasing him or beating him up again.

"Go away already!" one kid yelled and threw a stone at Zatch

Zatch didn't turn around; he just started to walk a little faster.

Zeno couldn't even look at Zatch anymore; it either was too embarrassing or disgraceful.

"How can someone like him even hold the Bell family name?" Zeno growled.

Zeno looked at the instructor's orb again

"Can I kill him now?" Zeno asked annoyed

In response the orb hit Zeno in the head multiple times

"Ok, ok, I'm taking that as a no" Zeno said disappointed. "I didn't think it was possible, but I hate him even more now" Zeno said clenching his fists.

Meanwhile Zatch had run off somewhere secluded

Zatch was in his normal hiding spot where he usually just laid under a tree to catch a nap

This time around Zeno didn't follow Zatch around.

"I'll show them what a member of the Bell family can really DO" Zeno growled

Meanwhile in the palace….

"He's seriously not going to do what I think he's going to do….right?" The instructor thought as he watched Zeno. "No…he's not stupid, I taught him better than that" The instructor reinsured himself.

Then in the instructor's horror, Zeno jumped out of the lookout to softly land on the school playground.

"Damn it!" the instructor smacked his face

Back with Zeno

…

"Zaker" Zeno responded summoning a large amount of lightning that completely obliterated the boulder the children were practicing on.

"What the?" the most of the kids responded then they all looked behind them to see a child in a white cloak that looked almost like Zatch.

"Zatch?" Sugino responded

"Zaker" Zeno growled

"SHIT!" All of the kids shouted as they barely dodged the lightning spell that was aimed at them.

"That's NOT ZATCH!" One older child responded

"Who cares! Let's freaking get this guy!" Sugino shouted and slammed his hand to the ground summoning a large root that went toward Zeno

Zeno extended his arm and opened up his hand to summon a large lightning sword

"To tell you the truth…I've had enough of this…I can't take it anymore…I can't keep on watching the BELL FAMILY NAME BEING DRAGGED IN THE MUD!" Zeno shouted as he slashed the large root in half.

In return the five other children who were picking on Zatch unleashed all of their spells at Zeno

A huge fire ball was hurdling toward Zeno, Zeno simply swipe it away like he was playing baseball.

Another child shot huge boulders at Zeno

In response Zeno dodged everyone and struck the child with his sword sending him flying 100's of feet away into the sky

Two other children shot out multiple energy beams at Zeno

Zeno blocked at slashed at all of the attacks with his sword

The kids were freighted of their adversary and started to runway, most of them were even crying.

"You're NOT GETTING AWAY!" Zeno shouted as he quickly gave chase and was about to finish the rest of his enemies off in one fell stroke

Until a large circular pink shield got in Zeno path,

Zeno tried cutting through it but failed

"That's enough" Tia responded

Zeno looked over to who created the shield, the person was to his right.

"Impressive, not many people can stop me with a simple spell" Zeno said with a grin

"…Who…Who are you?" Tia asked

"Me? It's better if I didn't say" Zeno stated

"You're Zatch's brother aren't you?" A voice responded

Zeno was a little shocked at the sudden answer and looked to his left to see a pink haired girl wearing a pink dress.

"How did you know?" Zeno asked

"Well you look like him" Koruru responded bluntly

Zeno scratched his head a little "maybe I should've worn a mask" Zeno said to himself

"Plus…you're defending him, so you must be a kind person." Koruru said softly

Zeno glared at her and his eyes opened very wide. "You THINK that I'm DEFENDING HIM? Why the hell would I do that? He's a nobody, a fool, a weakling and a coward. I would never defend someone like that!" Zeno shouted back at her

Koruru shuttered a little. "Then…why attack us?" Koruru asked

"Why? Because NO ONE mocks the family name while I'm here, I'm not defending Zatch, I'm defending our family name, plain and simple" Zeno explained

"Weird how Zatch never mentioned you" Tia responded while still on guard

"oh that…Zatch doesn't even know that I exist" Zeno stated

"Then…we should tell him" Koruru reacted

"I know Zatch…well sort of, and I'm sure he would love to see you, so how about we stop fighting…" Tia tried to explain

"Shit…" Zeno said and put his hand up to his face. "Well sorry about this, you two didn't drag my family name through the mud, but it seems like I'll have to give you the worst punishment out of them all" Zeno stated while his hands started to glow.

Zeno dashed at the girls, within a matter of seconds the battle was over

Zeno had wiped their memory clean of what happened today, only leaving a slight burn on the two girl's forehead.

"I don't want Zatch knowing who I am just yet" Zeno said as he teleported away leaving the girls alone.

…

…

…

9 AM

Zatch just woke up from his nap. It had been two hours since he had run away from the playground and he decided to give it another shot.

"I wonder if Ponygon or Kanchomé is around yet." Zatch wondered as he tracked his way back to the playground to see a bunch of adults searching the area.

The playground was nearly destroyed with scorched marks all over the place

Kanchomé was standing and watching what was going on.

"Kanchomé what happened?" Zatch asked

"Someone attacked the kids here and destroyed the playground" Kanchomé explained

"WHAT! Is everyone ok?" Zatch asked

"No…I seen Tia and Koruru, and some other kid taken away by the medical team" Kanchomé stated

Zatch felt like he was going to be sick

"Tia…and Koruru…but their so strong" Zatch responded

"Not only that but it was done by one person, that's what the survivors said anyways" Kanchomé said with a scared tone

"I hope Tia and Koruru will be ok" Zatch hoped

Meanwhile in the palace

"You FREAKING IDIOT!" The instructor shouted at Zeno

"What?" Zeno responded

"What my ass, what made you think destroying a playground was a good idea?" The instructor shouted

"Well they started it" Zeno countered

"They started on your brother, NOT you!" the instructor shot back

"I couldn't let the family name be dragged through the mud any longer, and after those vacation days are up, it won't need to any longer" Zeno explained

"This isn't about the family name Zeno. You were mad, so you decided to take it out on someone, and since you couldn't go kill Zatch, you decided to do the next best thing" the Instructor explained

"You know what I frankly don't CARE!" Zeno shouted as he locked himself inside his room again.

"Zeno you bastard! I can still shout through the door, it isn't sound proof!" The instructor shouted through the door.

Zeno must've laid on his bed for about 10 minutes listening to his Instructor/teacher yell at him

"He has a point, my door isn't sound proof…time to see what Zatch is doing" Zeno said to himself as he teleported out of his room near to Zatch's location.

Around 10 AM

Back with Zatch at a mamodo hospital.

With the playground being gone and now a criminal investigation, Zatch found out where Tia and Koruru were being kept but he couldn't visit them until tomorrow…

"I'm Sorry but only family is allowed to visit those mamodo for the time being" the nurse told a blond haired child

"But.." Zatch was cut off

"No buts, rules are rules, come back tomorrow" the Nurse stated and started on other work

Zatch walked out of the hospital to see Kanchomé still waiting for him

"I don't know why you would want to see strangling Tia, or that other girl, you barely know her" Kanchomé said while eating some chocolate

"Well we're in the same class, isn't that a good enough reason?" Zatch countered

"She most likely to start choking you as soon as she sees you" Kanchomé laughed

"I just…feel like it's my fault" Zatch said in a depressed tone

"Now you're talking weird, you weren't even their" Kanchomé responded

"Exactly, maybe I could've done something" Zatch countered

"Like what? Die? Even Tia was hurt, and you can't even protect yourself Zatch. Be happy that you weren't their" Kanchomé explained

Zatch didn't like Kanchomé's answer and started to walk away.

"Where you going Zatch?" Kanchomé asked

"I'm going to make a get well present!" Zatch yelled as he ran to a certain spot he knew he could make a great present.

"The hospital huh?...I didn't hurt them that much. Their wounds should be gone by tomorrow" Zeno said to himself as he then started to follow Zatch to see what he was up too.

…

…

It was about a 30 minute walk/jog for Zatch to reach his destination where there was a flower meadow

Zeno stayed hidden by floating in the air which was around 80 feet above Zatch.

Zatch went around picking a bunch of flowers, 30 in total.

"Unu, I'll give these to them tomorrow" Zatch said with a slight smile.

"He does know they will be released from the hospital by tomorrow right?" Zeno said to himself in a calm manner.

"Now what do I put these into?" Zatch asked himself.

Zatch didn't have any vases, nor cups he could borrow from his own home in fear of his foster mother objecting….

"Guess I have to make those too…" Zatch said to himself

"What does he do arts and craft?" Zeno mocked

And to Zeno's disbelief Zatch found an easy but thoughtful way of making his own vase

Zatch went to the woods where a certain type of tree had a very large leave which had a sticky paste to it.

Zatch took a bunch of those leaves which were the size of his head and shaped it into a cone like structure, and he used the paste of the bark, Zatch used the paste as glue. With that Zatch had made two easy ways of wrapping the flowers In a boneset like fashion.

"Well…he does spend most of his time outdoors. I guess he would pick up a few tricks" Zeno responded

Zatch then left the area with his two gifts

After Zatch left Zeno jumped off the tree he was staying in with a few of the large leaves in his hand.

"How hard can it be?" Zeno asked himself as he tried to make a mold the leave in a cone shape and use the glue like paste to keep it's shape…

…

…

Time and time again Zeno failed to do it, his wrappings looked more like crunched up hand fans.

"Why won't it work?" Zeno asked himself as he tried his 6th one and yet again the shape didn't hold, trying to applied more pressure Zeno again crushed his leave wrapping. "Damn it!" Zeno yelled then threw it on to the ground. "Screw it, time to spy on my brother some more" Zeno sighed then sensed out his brother's location, then teleported to him.

Zatch was heading back home and it was around 12 o clock

"I don't usually see him head home this early" Zeno said to himself as he followed Zatch thinking that this was his chance to see Zatch's perfect family lifestyle…

Zatch approached his own home and hesitated

Zatch looked at the house and gulped not wanting to enter.

But he knew he couldn't carry around flowers all day, where else would he put them?

Zatch slowly, Very slowly walked to the front door hoping that Yuno was in the bathroom or something and he could go in and out very quickly.

Is luck on Zatch's side?

Meanwhile Zeno is still waiting for Zatch to enter his own home.

Authors note: I guess I'll end it here, next time on Alternate Events: Zatch and Zeno!

Zatch will encounter Yuno, and Zeno will observe Zatch's family lifestyle. What will happen to Zeno's opinion of Zatch? Will he intervene? Will he stand by and let it happen? Or will he join in on Zatch's suffering?


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter 5 Yuno

Authors note: …I will say that I don't like writing this chapter, but it must be done in order for the story to go on. But just because I don't like writing this chapter doesn't mean that I won't make it a good chapter, unfortunately for Zatch.

Zatch finally opened up the front door leading inside to the living room. To the right of the living room was the Zatch's room, to the left of the living room was the kitchen, and leading straight was the stars which went upstairs, Yuno's room was up there and so was the bathroom.

_(Let her be in the bathroom, or upstairs sleeping. Please!)_ Zatch thought and hoped, as he looked around to see to his horror, Yuno was sitting on the living room couch.

Zeno og course got in close for he could see what was going on, Zeno looked at Zatch and what he thought was Zatch's foster mother. He got a clear view of what was going on through the living room window.

Yuno glared at Zatch who looked like he saw a ghost

"What the hell are you doing with those?" Yuno asked in a menacing tone and was referring to Zatch's flowers

Zatch looked terrified and backed away a little.

"I…it's a get well…" Zatch was interrupted

"You know about my allergies and yet you bring those here you MORON!" Yuno shouted and was now walking toward Zatch.

"They're for my friends" Zatch quickly responded and put the Get well present behind his back.

"You don't have any friends, you never will" Yuno countered as she picked Zatch up by his cloak

Zatch yelled and cried as Yuno ripped Zatch's gift out of his hands and threw them onto the ground.

"Please don't" Zatch begged

Yuno started stopping on Zatch's get well present until petals and stems were scattered across the floor.

_(Wha…is this?)_ Zeno thought to himself as he started to clench his fists.

"No" Zatch cried as he was dropped to the floor and was upset about what Yuno had just done.

"I don't think you quite get it do you?" Yuno said as she noticed something new on Zatch

It was a brand new container which had engravings on it, and a few symbols.

Yuno snatched Zatch's birthday present and looked at it

Zatch didn't speak up, he didn't want to get in more trouble.

"Where did you get this?" Yuno asked in a annoyed tone

"I got it from my friends" Zatch responded squeamishly

She glared at Zatch

"You don't have any friends you thieve" Yuno shouted as she started beating Zatch with his own present

"I didn't steal it I swear" Zatch cried out while he covered his head from the blows.

"You idiot do you think I would believe such a half assed story?" Yuno shot back as she kept on beating Zatch with the metal container, using it like a hammer.

Zatch curled up into a ball as the only means to defend himself, and cried and begged her to stop.

Zeno was in some sort of daze as confusion over took him.

(This…isn't what I thought it was…his life is as miserable…as mine) Zeno thought to himself as he stopped looking through the window and sat on the ground.

Zeno covered his ears as if to block out Zatch's crying.

The beating must've went on for 10 minutes because Zeno still couldn't block out the noise coming from the house.

(Such….damn it! What should I do? You're telling me he's not even safe in his own home?) Zeno thought as electricity started to build up in his body. (I wasn't wrong about everything….no Zatch is still a weakling coward…or is he simply a pacifist?) Zeno thought in anguish to what he should do. (He doesn't even know me, if I were to simply kill that witch, would he see me as a monster too? Plus I hated him for as long as I knew about his existence…how could I possibly?) Zeno wondered, Zeno then spotted his instructor's orb still hovering near the window observing everything.

"Bastard!" Zeno shouted

In the chaos of Zatch's beating, Yuno heard the sudden outburst.

"Who's there?" Yuno shouted and walked toward the window where Zeno was near

Zeno still out of Yuno's field of vision started to build up energy within his hand, his hand glowed a bright blue color.

"Zak…" Zeno was cut off by another loud bang

It was Zatch running out of the house as quickly as he possibly could while still holding parts of his body which had been badly damaged

"Zatch! Where the hell do you think you're going?" Yuno shouted as she ran outside and chucked the container at Zatch which missed.

Zatch stopped running and picked up his birthday present which had spots of his blood on it, and big dents. Zatch then ran away with nothing but his cloak and his gift from Ponygon's family

Zeno clenched his fists and teleported back to the castle before he lost his temper

Zeno teleported right into his instructor's training room where he was using the orb to spy on Zeno and Zatch.

"You son of a bitch! DIE!" Zeno shouted as he launched a very powerful Zakerga

"My lord!" The instructor responded but countered with a spell which summoned a large powerful shield that connected with his arm

The condensed lightning spell sent the instructor slamming into the wall

"You knew and didn't tell me? You made me look like a complete ASS!" Zeno shouted as he used Teozakeru

The instructor used his large shield once again but it broke, and the lightning went coursing through the instructor's body.

"AHHH" the instructor screamed in pain. The instructor struggled to get up but he didn't need to since Zeno sent him flying into the ceiling using a lightning sword.

As the instructor nearly got stuck to the ceiling, "My lord…I swear…" The instructor tried to speak but was met with another Zaker which caused him to fall to the ground.

"If I had known…" Zeno said quietly as he sat down on the ground.

"I swear…I didn't know…I just…found out…as you did" The instructor said as he coughed up blood.

"The way it happened…it's likely it happened more than once" Zeno said quietly

"So your view of him…been changed?" The instructor asked

"I…won't kill him, but I still don't understand why Baou was given to him" Zeno explained

"What will…you do?" The instructor asked

"I don't know…" Zeno said. "I still dislike him, he's a coward and a weakling, he doesn't deserve Baou, but he doesn't need to go through that hell either" Zeno said as he got up and covered himself with his cloak.

"Were you…" The instructor was cut off

"What else do I have to do? I'm going to spy on Zatch some more" Zeno responded

Zeno teleported to his brother's presence and once again hid himself from Zatch's view

Zatch was still crying but was at his favorite fishing spot.

"Nuu…she ruined it" Zatch cried as he tried cleaning off his birthday present.

Zatch was hardly presentable to anyone, bruises everywhere, and some open wounds from the corner of the metal container.

"Still worried about the thing used to beat him…" Zeno said quietly

Zatch took a look at himself, and tried cleaning himself up.

"Can't stay here forever" Zatch told himself as he picked himself up and started walking in a familiar direction

Zeno of course followed, a little surprised that Zatch wasn't upset anymore

Zatch went back to the flower meadow and did the same thing as before, he picked the flowers, made a wrapping for them out of leaves, then headed back to his secret location where he thought no one knew about.

Zatch placed his gifts near a tree, and he sat under it and went to sleep again.

The day finally ended, Zeno stayed with Zatch for as long as possible until the sun started to set, yet Zatch never went back home, he stayed there in the woods throughout the night.


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter 6 Rein

Zatch woke up at his usual time which was 5 AM. The sun didn't even raise yet, the only thing Zatch could hear was the quietness of the woods around him.

The instructor had awakened Zeno up at around the same time

Zatch still looked like he was in a daze, a slight state of confusion.

"So what are you going to do now Zatch?" Zeno wondered as he was still trying to wake himself up.

Zeno of course didn't show himself yet, and was keeping an eye on him.

Zatch got up and took his two get well presents and made his way toward the hospital

"Will the hospital even let people in at this time?" Zeno asked himself

30 minutes later, Zatch arrived at the hospital

"But!" Zatch whined

"Sorry but the patents are still sleeping, wait a couple hours" the nurse replied

Zatch looked down a bit upset, then his stomach growled.

"Opp" Zatch responded

"There's a café down the hall, go get breakfast their" the nurse kindly instructed

Zeno was lying down on a bench outside of the hospital; he already knew why Zatch was there and didn't feel like he needed to spy on him.

"He's still on about those girls huh? HA he must have a crush on them" Zeno laughed a little. "I wonder if that duck boy said anything about me. I should've wiped his memory clean as well" Zeno stated

Zeno pulled out a book about tactics that his instructor told him to read whenever he had the chance.

A few hours later, Zatch was still waiting, and Zeno fell asleep on the bench like some hobo, with the book covering his face.

"Hey, boy! You can go visit them now. They should be in the same room. They're at building 2-102" The nurse explained

"Unu thanks!" Zatch said as he ran over to see Tia and Koruru

Zatch ran down the hall way at a quick pace, dodging other staff workers in the process.

"Tia! Koruru! You two here?" Zatch asked as he entered the room to see Tia and Koruru eating hospital food for breakfast.

"Zatch? What you doing here?" Tia responded

"Oh you're that boy" Koruru said pointing at Zatch since she didn't know him very well.

"Umm, I heard you two were attacked after I left" Zatch said in a depressed tone

"Well…" Tia and Koruru said in unison

"We don't remember anything about that day" Tia explained

"What? How could you forget?" Zatch responded

"You idiot we didn't forget anything, we were hit by a spell" Tia yelled

Tia was about to go after Zatch until…

"Here you go, sorry Tia but…I have to go" Zatch said while giving Tia, and Koruru their present.

"Flowers? Zatch, we're fine…but thanks" Tia said with a smile and put the flowers with the rest of them on the table.

Koruru was looking at the wrapping and went to thank Zatch, but he had already left the room.

"He's gone already?" Tia said confused

Zatch walked out of the hospital as quickly as possible but noticed someone sleeping on the bench.

"Is he ok?" Zatch asked himself as he went closer to the sleeping boy with a white cloak.

"Umm…hello?" Zatch called out while being about five feet away from the boy.

"Give me 10 more minutes" Zeno responded while he still had the book covering his face.

"Are you ok? The hospital is right there" Zatch pointed out

"I'm fine" Zeno mumbled

"Nuu…you don't sound fine" Zatch responded a little worried

"What's the matter with you" Zeno yelled while taking a peak at who he was talking to. When Zeno peaked through a slight opening to see he was talking to Zatch he nearly had a heart attack. "Holy SHIT" Zeno blurted out then made sure the book was covering his face entirely

"What's wrong?" Zatch asked

"Nothing! Nothing's wrong!" Zeno yelled

_(SHIT, SHIT, SHIT! Why did I have to fall asleep on a bench? Damn it this isn't the way I want Zatch to find out who I am! I don't want him to think I'm some sort of hobo!)_ Zeno thought to himself as he tried coming up with many ways of distracting Zatch long enough to run away.

"Well…I don't know" Zatch said scratching his head.

"I'm fine!" Zeno yelled

"But you don't look fine" Zatch explained

_(Wait…do I look sick?)_ Zeno wondered

"Plus you're reading a weird book" Zatch said as he went to grab the book.

"Don't touch me!" Zeno shouted while pressing the book closer to his face.

(I guess I am reading weird things given my age) Zeno agreed but still didn't want Zatch to see his face for it would be pretty easy to tell that they were related.

"Unu, sorry" Zatch responded while backing away a little

"Ok you can leave now" Zeno ordered

"But…I get the feeling you're hiding something" Zatch responded

_(WHY! Is it all of a sudden he wants grow a brain? I have to trick him or something…where's my instructor with that weird orb)_ Zeno thought

Meanwhile back at the palace

"He's the worst spy I've ever seen in my life" The instructor laughed as wondered what Zeno would do to get out of the situation.

Back with Zatch and Zeno

_(Ok...I can't hurt him, I can't attack him with lightning speed, and I absolutely cannot kill him, so what the hell do I do?)_ Zeno thought to himself then thought of an idea

"Hey what will it take for you to leave me alone?" Zeno asked

"Umm…show me that book" Zatch asked

"Wrong answer!" Zeno said while pointing his finger into the sky

"Huh?" Zatch responded

"How about I show you a magic trick, then you leave alone, I can even do it with my eyes closed" Zeno explained while taking out some of his silver hair off his scalp.

"Ooo Really!" Zatch said in a excited manner

"Yes, now go play with a puppet" Zeno said as he transformed his hair into a scarecrow/puppet looking figure.

"So cool" Zatch said as the scarecrow started circling around him

Zeno used this chance to make a quick getaway and teleported for Zatch couldn't see who he was

"Huh? He left…aww, I want another scarecrow" Zatch said as he looked at the figure and it was right beside him.

"Holy shit! Was that close!" Zeno sighed and put his hand up to his chest in order to feel his heartbeat, which felt like it was beating 200 times per second. "Lesson learned, don't fall asleep on benches" Zeno told himself.

Zeno was hovering over Zatch, high in the sky, and he still had a good view of him.

"Should I take back my scarecrow?" Zeno wondered

Zatch was still playing around with Zeno's Scarecrow, and he looked like he was having fun.

"I guess I'll let him keep it for one day" Zeno said with a small smile

"Will you like to come with me?" Zatch asked the puppet

Since Zeno could control the puppet, he decided to play along

"**Where are you going**?" The scarecrow asked, Zeno was now in control of the scarecrow.

The scarecrow had a deep sort of scary voice, but Zatch didn't seem to mind.

"Umm, I don't know…anywhere seems nice though, a place with a lot of Yellow Tail" Zatch explained then started walking down the road which was the opposite way to his house

The scarecrow stayed beside Zatch, while Zeno followed them from a good distance away.

Zatch took the main road out of the capital of the mamodo world and headed south. They went toward large some large mountains which were barely visible.

While walking for about an half an hour, Zatch kept on singing a song about the tree's and the wind

"**We've been walking for a while now, where are we going**?" the scarecrow asked

"Anywhere…" Zatch responded with a slightly depressed mood

"…What a lame answer, he's obviously running away…is that all he can do is run from his problems?" Zeno asked himself

"So mister Scarecrow, what was your master's name?" Zatch asked the puppet figure

"I probably shouldn't tell him my name…then again, he wouldn't know who I am just by my name would he?" Zeno wondered

The scarecrow went quiet as Zeno went into deep thought

"**Why would I know his name**?" the scarecrow responded

"Well he made you, so you gotta know" Zatch answered

"He's not as stupid as I thought….I guess" Zeno mocked. "Fine, just for the hell of it, I'll tell him my name, it won't reveal who I am in the least anyhow" Zeno tried to convince himself

"**Fine, his name is Zeno" **The Scarecrow explained

"Zeno huh…that's a nice name" Zatch responded

The two then traversed up a large hill, which blocked their vision of what was on the other side.

When Zatch got over the hill, he could see large spiky mountains which had a dark cloud cover.

"That's a good spot" Zatch said pointing at a passage way

"**So you're going to go through their**?" the scarecrow asked

"Unu" Zatch responded as he kept on walking

"Huh, he's not scared then." Zeno said, barely impressed

Zatch walked through the mountains and heard yelling and screaming, even explosions

"What's that?" Zatch said with a scared tone

The noise echoed throughout the entire mountain range

"He's right…sounds like a battle of sorts" Zeno said to himself

Meanwhile near the cliff of the mountain range, a village was under attack by a huge wild mamodo.

The mamodo was twice the size of his brethren, had white fur, looked sort of like a bear, and had huge claws and fangs.

"Stop him! Rein is out of control again!" One of the villagers shouted

Rein picked up two mamodo, one with each hand and threw them across the town.

"Don't mess with me you weaklings!" Rein shouted

"Everyone, gather in formation and push him off the cliff" a royal solider instructed

Most the villagers gathered around the one solider in order to do combat with the mighty Rein

"Now PUSH!" the solider ordered as he and the villagers took formation and pushed Rein off the mountain cliff and looked down to see Rein plummet down to death valley

Meanwhile back with Zatch

"Oh…the noise stopped" Zatch said as he took a sigh in relieve

Zatch then heard a loud roar of pain

"We should go check it out" Zatch told the scarecrow figure

"**If you insist**" the scarecrow responded

Zatch started running through the mountain path trying to be careful not to slip because the ground was sharp and razor sharp that it would tear flesh easily

Zatch ran around a bend in the mountain's path to find a large creature that looked badly wounded and it bleeding profusely

"Mister are you ok?" Zatch asked Rein

"**Leave him be Zatch, he'll be dead by morning**" The scarecrow explained

"What No!" Zatch responded

The two talking caught Rein's attention

"Mister please give me your hand" Zatch begged while running toward Rein

"Hey you! Do you know who I am? Anyone who underestimates me ends up on the end of these claws!" Rein shouted while showing Zatch his claws

"**I frankly don't care who you are, die, and see if I care**" The scarecrow stated while slowly circling Rein in a mocking like fashion. "**Zatch leave him be or you will get hurt**" The scarecrow explained

"Damn IT!" Rein shouted as he crushed the scarecrow with his hands, the Scarecrow disappeared in pieces of silver hair.

Zatch was upset that his friend was just crushed but he knew that it was only a spell to begin with, and right now he had a real life that needed saving.

Zatch walked up to Rein a little

"Don't act like you care brat!" Rein yelled as he took a swing at Zatch

Zatch dodged but didn't back off.

"Leave or…" Rein coughed up blood. "I'll tear you limb from limb!" Rein shouted

"So what is Zatch going to do?" Zeno wondered. "I let the scarecrow to tell him leave him alone, let see if he fails like always" Zeno mocked

Zeno then spotted his instructor's orb

"20 gold coins, I bet Zatch runs away, if he does I win, if he doesn't you win. Deal?" Zeno asked the floating orb

In response the orb went up and down

"Sweat, I can buy myself something when this is over" Zeno said with a smile

"What are you saying? You're the one who's going to die if you don't get help." Zatch responded to Rein's threat. "So please let me help you!" Zatch shouted

Rein seemed to calm down and lowered his guard

Zatch in response used his strength to pick up Rein's massive body and carry him out of the mountains.

"I…I didn't expect that" Zeno said very surprised. "He actually passed, he…so he's not a coward? Then what the heck Is he?" Zeno wondered

The instructor's orb then hit Zeno in the head

"What!...oh yeah…I owe you 20 coins right?" Zeno responded

The orb hit Zeno in the head again.

"What you want it in GOLD TOO! Where is a child supposed to get that kind of cash?" Zeno shouted. "OW, ow, ow, ow" Zeno yelled as the instructor's orb repeatedly smashed him in the head.

Zeno ran around dodging his instructor's orb while Zatch took care of Rein.

"I won't let you die" Zatch stated while he let Rein rest by a tree.

"Wh…what is your name boy?" Rein asked

Before Zatch went off to look for herbs or whatever he could use as bandages.

"My name is Zatch Bell" Zatch introduced himself then ran off into the woods to look for supplies

About 20 minutes later Zatch came with an armful of herbs and dry wood.

"Mister, you still ok for now?" Zatch asked in a worried manner

"Call me Rein" Rein told Zatch his name

Zeno was now once again spying on Zatch, but he had lumps all over his head, 20 of them to be exact.

"We're even now" Zeno said to the orb, while rubbing his head.

"AHH!" Rein shouted

"Sorry!" Zatch responded as Zatch applied a certain type of healing herb to Rein's wound

"…it's…fine…" Rein responded but then began thinking. "Zatch…why were you there to begin with?" Rein asked

"Umm" Zatch tried changing the subject. "I don't have any bandages so this will have to do" Zatch explained while he ripped parts of his cloak off.

"Is that really ok?" Rein asked

"Unu, for some reason, no matter what I do to it, it's always clean and repaired when I wake up" Zatch explained

"Is that so?" Rein responded as he took a closer look at Zatch's broach that was on his mantle.

Zeno was observing Rein closely as he quickly found out that Rein was no fool, and was already finding stuff out about Zatch.

"We got ourselves a smartass" Zeno mocked

Rein glared into the trees where Zeno was hiding

"Wha? He can sense me in his current state?" Zeno wondered but took no chances.

Zeno teleported away

_(Could've been my imagination….but it's best if we don't stay here)_ Rein thought.

"Zatch…is there any place safe for us to go?" Rein asked

Zatch looked slightly confused "It doesn't really matter, I can't move you without hurting you" Zatch tried to explain

Rein transformed into a human

"There, I should be lighter for you to carry now" Rein stated

"WOW! You're like Kanchomé" Zatch said with amazement

_(I know for sure…someone was spying on us…but who was it?) _Rein thought

"Zatch…I don't want to scare you…but this place isn't safe, you've already bandaged me up. Is there any place you can bring me for a day or two?" Rein asked

"Not safe…" Zatch looked around slightly scared, but then tried to think of safe places to go…

_(I…I don't know of any)_ Zatch thought as it dawned on him that Rein really needed his help.

Zatch looked confused and slightly hopeless

"What about your home? A boy your age must have one" Rein responded

Zatch got even more scared

_(I…never brought someone home with me before…maybe she wouldn't hurt me with guests around?) _Zatch thought to himself.

"If you don't want to Zatch, it's fine" Rein said as he started to look around to see if he could sense that aura again.

"Nuu…It will be ok…I…I'll bring you there" Zatch said while being very unsure of himself.

"Thank you Zatch…I owe you my life" Rein said as he allowed himself to fall asleep.

Zatch in response picked Rein up and put him on his back to make the journey home...

Zatch carried Rein on his back the entire way there, it took Zatch an hour to reach his house, a place he dreaded dearly

But for some reason, Rein didn't want to go to the hospital, nor any government facilities such as medical care.

"We're…here" Zatch told Rein in a very low tone

Rein smiled "Thank you Zatch…" Rein responded as he looked at Zatch's home

Zatch quietly walked up to the front door

_(Please! If there is a god, Please god let her be upstairs taking the biggest poop of her life!)_ Zatch hoped and prayed

Zatch opened up the front door and to his surprise Yuno wasn't in the living room, nor the kitchen.

Zatch quickly ran inside his room and laid Rein down on his torn up bed

Rein looked around

"Who's room is this?" Rein asked

"Umm…it's mine" Zatch responded

Rein thought this was very strange since Zatch's room looked like trash, and the rest of the house and good decent furniture, good wall paper.

Zatch's room didn't have any of that, it was mostly empty.

Zatch laid down besides Rein

"You need anything?" Zatch asked

"Water." Rein responded

Zatch handed Rein his battered container

Rein didn't think much of it, Zatch was four years old, so why would his personal stuff be a little beat up?

"Just don't make any noise ok" Zatch told Rein

"Why not?" Rein responded

"ju…just don't" Zatch said and laid his head down on Rein to fall asleep

"This whole situation is too strange" Rein said to himself but decided it was none of his business

Meanwhile in the palace

"You left him early today" the instructor stated

"He could sense me, what was I supposed to do? Get caught?" Zeno shot back

"Oh? It wouldn't be the first time yo acted foolishly, sleeping on a bench, giving Zatch one of your scarecrow's to play with, then letting the scarecrow tell Zatch your name!" The instructor said in a annoyed fashion.

"Yeah, so what?" Zeno said nonchalantly

"You're honestly the worst spy I've ever seen in my entire life" the instructor told Zeno.

"Yeah, yeah, who cares" Zeno said as he entered his own room and was about to lock it.

"Hey! You still owe me 20 gold coins you brat!" The instructor shouted

"That's a week's pay for you, I get that like once every two months, leave me alone" Zeno responded

"Oh? Watch, every time it's my turn to wake you up, it's going to be in a horrible fashion" The instructor threaten Zeno

"I'll lock my door" Zeno shouted as he locked his door and read his book until it was time to go to sleep.


	7. Chapter 7

Chapter 7 Crossing the line

Authors Note: I will be using Ponygon as that horse mamodo's name, it's faster to spell. And wow is it hard to get into Rein's character, I barely know the character!

The next day came, Zatch woke up and in a traditional like style, and he looked around to see if any danger was present inside his room, which there was none.

Zatch had actually slept in late for once, the sun had already risen. Rein was still sleeping with around half of his wounds nearly healed.

Zatch took a good look at his friend, and it looked like his bandages needed changing.

_(Umm…I should wait until he wakes up)_ Zatch thought, he didn't want to leave his room with the possibility of meeting Yuno. Zatch laid back down trying to go to sleep.

Meanwhile back at the king's palace.

"Hey! Zeno get your lazy ass up!" The instructor shouted outside of Zeno's room.

Zeno had locked his door in order to prevent his instructor waking him up in a horrible way.

"Uhh…" Zeno slowly got up out of bed, and looked at the clock to find out its 9 AM. "What the? Why so late?" Zeno wondered as he got out of bed and got ready for the day ahead.

When Zeno was ready he teleported to Zatch's location and decided to take a look around the house.

Zeno found that the large mamodo Rein was sleeping soundly with Zatch, Zatch was only about half asleep.

Further investigation, Zeno found that Yuno was in her room reading something.

"Ha it almost looks like a regular family" Zeno mocked as he jumped off of Yuno's roof to land on the ground and wait until Zatch actually got up.

About an hour later, Rein finally woke up; Zeno finished reading that tactics book.

"I…survived" Rein said as he woke up.

"I told you that I wouldn't let you die" Zatch responded as if he were waiting for Rein to wake up.

Rein tried sitting upright but found it a little difficult.

"Must've went down tumbling down that cliff" Rein responded to the pain in his ribs.

"You're ok now though right?" Zatch asked concerned.

Rein moved his body around a little

"I'll be fully healed by sundown, so I'm fine…" Rein stated then stared at Zatch. _(You wouldn't believe that this child…would stand up to such power and might. Yet I know it wasn't a dream, for the first time, it felt like someone cared for me) _Rein thought and smiled at Zatch.

"I'll go get breakfast" Zatch said but quietly walked out of his room, then turned around. "Don't make too much noise" Zatch stated.

"Again with that? Oh and where are your parents? I would like to thank them as well" Rein stated.

"Umm, yeah, let's not do that…sorry but I don't want her knowing that you were here Rein" Zatch tried to explain nicely.

Rein was a little confused by what Zatch said and took it the wrong way…

_(Ha, knew it was too good to be true. Most likely his parents would view me as a monster, or a criminal…but Zatch did save my life, so I will still show my gratitude)_ Rein thought. "That's fine Zatch…so what we having for breakfast?" Rein asked curiously.

"Umm…I will try to catch us a fish" Zatch responded happily.

"Wouldn't it be faster to just go to the kitchen?" Rein laughed a little.

"What about big fish?" Zatch requested again.

Rein just thought that Zatch really wanted fish.

"You're a little odd…but in a good way" Rein laughed.

"Umm thanks?" Zatch responded not knowing if he should take that statement as a compliment.

Zatch then quietly walked out of the house and went to his favorite fishing spot and tried to catch more than one fish.

Meanwhile Zeno was trying to figure out what to do with his time…

"It's boring just watching Zatch taking care of a criminal like a lost puppy" Zeno stated while trying to find something fun to do.

Zeno was walking near the playground he previously destroyed.

The playground had been fully repaired by the powers of the adult mamodo, and the investigations stopped nearly as soon as they began. The kids were playing at the park again but with a few adult mamodo watching them.

"It's as if nothing happened" Zeno said and grinned a little until someone jumped on him from behind. "What the?" Zeno yelled as his instincts kicked in and he put his aggressor into a headlock.

Zeno looked at who 'attacked' him, it was a small brown horse mamodo. "Meru…meru…mey" The horse mamodo struggled to say.

"Huh?" Zeno responded while being totally confused to what the horse just said.

"Meru, Meru MEY!" the horse yelled then started to lose oxygen because of Zeno's grip.

"Are you trying to make fun of me?" Zeno said as he tightened his hold on the horse mamodo's neck.

"Meru…" the horse mamodo said and was about to faint.

"Oh…you must be one of those riding horse clans that my instructor told me about…" Zeno said looking at the mamodo. "Plus you look to young to speak" Zeno responded while looking at the horse mamodo's eyes starting to close.

Zeno let the horse mamodo go.

The horse mamodo took in deep breathes and started shouted at Zeno.

"MERU, MERU, MERU, MEY, MERU, MEY!" the horse mamodo shouted.

Zeno looked at the horse with a blank face.

Zeno then started laughing "I have no idea what you're saying!" Zeno laughed.

"Meru?" The horse responded and took a good look at Zeno, and started circling him and sniffing him.

"Hey, hey, what's your deal? I don't even know you." Zeno stated.

"Meru! Mey~~~" the horse responded

"This is even more ANNOYING! I don't know what you're saying!" Zeno tried to explain.

"Is that Zatch?" an adult's voice called out.

Zeno turned around to see an even larger horse, which looked familiar.

_(Oh…I know him…I think Zatch said it was…Ponygon's father! So this here is Ponygon) _Zeno thought then looked at the small horse mamodo. _(He must've thought I was Zatch)_ Zeno concluded. "Sorry it's mistaken identity" Zeno responded to Ponygon's father.

"Wow you do look a lot like Ponygon's friend, 'Zatch'" Ponygon's father responded.

"Well I never heard of this person" Zeno lied.

"Is that so? Well it looks like you two would get along great with each other" Ponygon's father responded.

"I doubt it, just because I look like him is that why?" Zeno retorted.

"Well, Zatch can get along with just about anyone, if they give him a chance" Ponygon's father explained.

"Is that so?" Zeno looked at Ponygon. _(Well he can't speak, so I guess it wouldn't be a bad thing if…)_ Zeno thought. "Well what's his name" Zeno pointed.

"Well Zatch calls him Ponygon" Ponygon's father introduced his son.

_(I already knew that…but I have to play along)_ Zeno thought. "Well Ponygon, my name is Zeno" Zeno tried to introduce himself and put out his hand in friendly manner.

Ponygon responded by biting his hand.

"OUCH! He freaking bit me!" Zeno shouted as he snatched his hand back, and then glared at Ponygon's father. "You didn't tell me he bites" Zeno growled.

"Well he's a bit shy, I thought since you looked like Zatch that he would take a liken to you as well…but I guess not" Ponygon's father responded.

_(Was it just payback for that choke hold I put on him?)_ Zeno wondered. "Well I better get going" Zeno said then walked away toward Zatch's house.

When Zeno was far enough away…

"Kids these days…are such terrible liars, I wonder how long he's going to follow Zatch around" Ponygon's father asked himself.

Meanwhile back with Zatch.

Zatch had caught two large fish and once again quietly walked inside the house and into his room.

"I'm back" Zatch said happily as he handed Rein a large fish which was twice the size of Zatch.

Zatch's fish was a bit smaller.

Rein thanked Zatch but still couldn't shake the feeling that something was wrong in the house.

Zatch always seemed afraid, and would occasionally listen to hear if anything moved up stairs.

"I'm betting your parents are upstairs" Rein stated.

"She's…not my mom" Zatch responded bluntly.

"So…" Rein tried looking around the room to see if he could play with something with Zatch, and there was nothing. "You got anything fun to do here?" Rein asked.

Zatch was busy eating his yellow tail, "no" Zatch replied simply.

_(This is a little depressing)_ Rein was a little shocked.

Zatch finished eating his yellow tail.

"Unu, do you want me to change your bandages now Rein?" Zatch asked.

Rein looked at himself, "Well yeah, but I can do it myself now Zatch" Rein explained. "Do you have a first aid kit?" Rein asked

Zatch thought for a moment then got scared.

"Umm…yes" Zatch responded.

"Can you go get it?" Rein asked politely.

Zatch moved his head up and down very slowly then got up.

"Yes" Zatch answered, and then gulped.

Zatch walked out of his room and into the living room.

"Ok, in and out, in and out" Zatch told himself as he started to breathe quietly.

Zatch walked upstairs in a tip toe like fashion, being careful not to make any noise.

Zatch finally made it up stairs and looked at Yuno's bedroom door, and across from there was the bathroom.

_(That's where it was last time)_ Zatch thought as he remembered a bad memory.

Zatch walked into the bathroom and started to open the drawers which were under the sink, most of the stuff seemed normal, toothpaste, toothbrushes, combs, soap, and finally way in the back was the first aid kit.

Zatch had to reach all the ways back behind the drawers in order to get a large first aid kit. While pulling it out Zatch spilled bottles of soap, among other products which made a crashing sound all over the floor.

_(Why me?)_ Zatch wondered.

Rein heard the noise from downstairs.

"Ah, that must've been Zatch" Rein told himself.

Zatch quickly put everything back in place and ran out of the bathroom and down stairs before he heard the Woman from across from him get up.

Zatch basically fell down stairs because he ran so fast.

_(Maybe she didn't hear it…)_ Zatch tried convincing himself.

"Ok got to go to Rein" Zatch told himself as he started walking and stopped to a deafening shouting.

"WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT?" Yuno shouted from upstairs.

Zatch looked confused to what he should do, should he hide, should he run?

But Zatch knew he couldn't do any of them since Rein was inside his room and he didn't know what sort of punishment he would face for it.

"ZATCH was that you, you bastard!" Yuno shouted and got out of her room to check if anything broke.

"I didn't break anything I swear!" Zatch yelled upstairs.

Yuno checked the bathroom to see nothing was broken…but that didn't matter since she still had to get out of bed to check in the first place.

Of course Zeno was close by and could already predict what was about to happen.

Zeno started to walk away from the house to a distance to where the house was still visible but the wind had muffled and blocked all the noise coming from the house.

The instructor's orb though did not leave the house and stayed relatively close.

"Damn bastard" Zeno responded.

Yuno ran down stairs with a horribly scary face.

"What the hell did you do?" Yuno shouted then seen that Zatch was holding a first aid kit.

"I didn't do anything" Zatch responded.

"Then why are you trying to steal MY stuff" Yuno shouted at Zatch then went to snatch the first aid kit from Zatch.

Zatch latched his body around it, trying to defend it.

"Give it back, or you'll be needing that kit soon I swear you will" Yuno shouted.

"I just need it for a moment" Zatch pleaded but was meet with a blow from Yuno's hand.

Zatch stood his ground, still holding the medical kit.

Rein heard shouting and got worried.

"Zatch! Is everything ok?" Rein asked as he struggled to get up to his feet.

Zatch froze in place, and so did Yuno.

"You brought someone here? Who the fuck is it?" Yuno whispered as she lifted Zatch off his feet.

"He…he's my friend" Zatch responded.

Yuno threw Zatch to the floor, which made a loud thump.

"What's going on out there? Answer me!" Rein shouted then collapsed to the floor.

Yuno stared at Zatch's room, the door had a slight gap in it…

"You trying to set me up?" Yuno responded.

Yuno walked to Zatch's door and opened it to find a large wounded mamodo. She recognized what clan he was from as well.

"What happened?" Rein demanded, now trying to stand up.

Yuno looked at him silently then grinned.

"Ha, glad to know you" Yuno responded then closed Zatch's door and locked it from outside.

"HEY!" Rein shouted.

Meanwhile with Zeno

_(A criminal has no power in government law…plus she read the newspaper, Rein's face was on the front page as a wanted criminal)_ Zeno thought to himself as he knew Rein couldn't do anything.

"Zatch…did you honestly think you could fool me?" Yuno asked in a slightly crazed fashion, she then went after Zatch who was still holding the medical kit.

Rein soon heard crying and screaming coming from the living room.

"HEY DAMN IT, what you DOING!" Rein shouted, Rein constantly struggled to get up on his feet, to the point that his wounds started to reopen.

Rein couldn't stand it, constantly hearing the person who saved his life beg for mercy.

"Damn it Zatch give it back already!" Yuno shouted.

"NO" Zatch responded.

After about 3-5 minutes of hearing this go back and forth, Rein punched a massive hole in the wall and glared at Yuno.

Rein had not expected the wall to be so strong, for some reason one part of house walls was reinforced with steel. It didn't take him long to notice that Zatch's entire room walls were reinforced.

"You Bitch, lay another hand on him and I'll freaking rip your HEAD OFF!" Rein shouted through the hole. Rein's entire face had changed from friendly into a raging beast.

Zatch was using his body to cover the medical kit. He was pretty beaten up by Yuno just constantly kicking him.

Yuno got scared of Rein and ran upstairs.

In response Zatch looked up and smiled at Rein.

"Thank you Rein." Zatch thanked then walked to his door to unlock it then enter his room.

Zatch seen that Rein hardly moved from his spot since his legs were still badly damaged.

"I got the medical kit Rein" Zatch said then sat down next to him.

Zeno figured out that the beating was over by the way his instructor's orb was moving.

"Must be over" Zeno said then went close to the house to see what was happening.

"Damn it…If I had known Zatch…I would have never asked to come here" Rein explained.

"It's fine" Zatch responded.

"NO its not!" Rein shouted back at Zatch.

Zatch got slightly scared and backed away.

"Sorry…it's just that…I'm continuing to make your life harder than it already is" Rein said in a depressed tone.

"That's not true! We're friends aren't we? We're supposed to help one another" Zatch explained.

Rein looked away from Zatch and looked at the hole he made in the wall.

"This place, it's like a prison, it's only worse for you since you've never did anything wrong" Rein stated.

Zatch looked down unsure of his statement, "but she said that I did…" Zatch was cut off...

"Don't ever think that Zatch" Rein interrupted, as he glared at Zatch.

Zatch agreed, as he wanted to cry for a moment but didn't.

"I swear I'll pay you back for your kindness" Rein interrupted. "I'll be able to walk by sundown, I'll be able to fight again by sundown" Rein stated

"So you're feeling better already?" Zatch asked still a little worried

"Ha! Still worried about me are you? You're beat up to you know" Rein joked but then got serous. "Zatch, I don't care what you say, by sundown, I'm taking you away from here" Rein proclaimed.

"What!" Zatch said in a shocked manner, but hopeful as well.

_(Didn't see that coming)_ Zeno thought while being surprised.

Unfortunately Yuno heard the same statement through the gaping hole in the wall which was made by Rein

"Really? I can come with you!" Zatch said happily.

This of course didn't surprise Rein, it must've been an easy choice.

"And if that witch stands in my way, I'll lop her head off with these claws" Rein stated with a smile.

"Please don't hurt her!" Zatch responded.

_(What?!)_ Rein was pretty shocked by this as well.

Zeno was also confused,_ (I would actually kill that bitch with my own hands if I were him) _Zeno thought.

"You really are odd Zatch" Rein stated.

_(Hmm…with him around wouldn't it be a bit more difficult to try and take Baou back?)_ Zeno thought to himself. _(Wait…is it even possible to even get Baou back from Zatch) _Zeno wondered. Zeno's face then went blank "Shit I don't even know that!" Zeno cursed then had to teleport back to the palace to find out.

_(That aura left again, I'll find out who it is when I'm able to walk on my legs again)_ Rein thought while he patched him and Zatch up by the medical kit.

Back with the palace, Zeno darted to the library.

Zeno looked around the library, and strangely enough he could only find the information he was looking for in a "Parenting Guide for Idiots".

"What?" Zeno skimmed through the pages and looked at how to give birth.

The instructor found Zeno sitting on a couch reading the book.

"What the?" The instructor peered over Zeno's shoulder.

Zeno got slightly annoyed, "Need something?" Zeno asked while still searching through the information

"You got a girlfriend Zeno" The instructor laughed.

"Shut up! None of this is true anyhow" Zeno said as he kept on skimming through pages he wished he hadn't laid his eyes on for at least another 6-8 years from now. "Why is it that our library sucks" Zeno questioned.

"You're just not looking hard enough" The instructor responded.

Zeno kept on reading through the book until a bright crimson red blush overcame his face. Zeno closed the book and turned to his instructor "Then you tell me what I need to know" Zeno demanded.

"That's more of a father's job" The instructor stated while scratching his chin.

"NOT THAT!" Zeno shouted, in an embarrassed expression.

"Oh?" The Instructor responded

"I was looking up power transfer, or spell transfer" Zeno explained.

"Then why were you looking in a parenting…you know what never mind" The instructor teased Zeno again.

"I want to know how to get Baou from Zatch" Zeno stated.

"Wait…didn't I already give you a book like that? The only way to gain that power is if Zatch knew of the power, was able to control it, then give it to you" The instructor explained.

"Wait what? That's impossible, Zatch can't even use his weakest spell, plus he doesn't even know me!" Zeno responded.

Zeno got upset and threw the book he was reading across the room.

"Screw it! There's no point in even spying on my brother anymore!" Zeno shouted.

"So you don't hate him anymore?" The instructor asked.

"Only a little bit…I guess, I was planning on using him to gain Baou, but you just said it's impossible" Zeno stated in a depressed manner. "And I don't care what happens to him anymore either! He's going to get a happy life with that Rein person" Zeno explained.

"Well I'm glad that you enjoyed your vacation my lord" The instructor stated.

"Ha! Sure a lot of my questions were finally answered…but it would've been faster if father just told me so in the first place, I didn't kill Zatch after all…although the way he acts sometimes makes me want to kill him, letting people bully him is just too pathetic for the Bell family name…" Zeno said still depressed at how things turned out.

"Then why is it that I hear regret in your voice?" The Instructor asked. "You got everything you asked for didn't you?" The instructor responded.

"No I didn't! I never found the reason to why Baou was given to Zatch in the first place! Does father simply want to lock the power away forever! Is that the only reason? My Father! He's not afraid of Anything! So why!" Zeno shouted then curled his legs up and hugged them. "It's like…he threw them away…Zatch and Baou both, simply thrown away" Zeno said in a depressed tone.

"Zeno, your father loves Zatch…" The instructor was cut off.

"How could you possibly know that?! That wrench beats him every day and you're telling me NO one noticed? He is the king and he couldn't stop it?" Zeno shouted now having serious doubts of what was going on.

The Instructor looked at Zeno and couldn't give him an answer.

"You should actually meet Zatch one day Zeno" The instructor told Zeno then walked away.

Zeno turned away from his instructor

"Like it's that simple" Zeno mocked. "Going from hating him, to being neutral… Zatch will be fine now…since he has Rein." Zeno said to himself. "Why would he want to meet someone like me?" Zeno asked.

The instructor walked back to his office and looked through his orb to see what was happening at Yuno's house.

"Sh…Shit!" The instructor shouted looking through his orb. "Damn it who gave out those orders!" The instructor wondered as he looked through the orb in shock. "Zeno has to know and quick!" The instructor shouted as he ran as quick as he could to Zeno, which was a couple hall ways down.

About a few minutes later the instructor came busting through library door

"Zeno! It's important, it's about Zatch" The instructor yelled.

"Yeah? And what of it? What is he getting beat on again? If so then I'd rather not hear, nor see it." Zeno stated while still relaxing in his comfortable chair.

"It's worse than that" The instructor told Zeno.

Zeno looked at the instructor for a moment. "Like what? Did he die?" Zeno asked being a little confused.

"She…must've called the royal guard on Rein" The instructor told Zeno .

"WHAT! Call them off now! That's an order!" Zeno ordered his instructor.

"I can't Zeno, the king would know that we were spying on Zatch" The instructor explained.

"Damn!" Zeno got up and threw the chair across the room.

Zeno was now even more confused than before.

_(Why…am I so freaking angry? I don't like Zatch, and I damn sure I don't acknowledge him as my brother…SO WHY!)_ Zeno tried to convince himself that he had no feeling toward Zatch.

"Are you going Zeno?" The instructor asked.

Zeno glared at him

"Of…of course not!" Zeno responded then sat on ground.

"So you don't care what happens to Zatch?" The instructor asked the boy.

"NO! Let him deal with his own problems! I got enough on my plate as it is" Zeno explained.

"Is it that hard to admit that we were wrong?" The instructor asked then walked away.

As the door closed.

"Freaking thought he'd never leave" Zeno said as he teleported Zatch's location.

When Zeno got a good view of what was happening he saw 5 royal guards on the floor beaten and knocked out.

"Damn you ALL!" Rein shouted as he charged 4 more royal guards

"He has no more strength for spells, finish him!" The captain of the royal guard ordered

"DON'T!" Zatch screamed but was being held by Yuno.

Summary of what the instructor saw

Yuno was holding Zatch as if she was scared for both of their lives, as if she had cared for Zatch.

This obviously fooled the royal guards in thinking that Rein 'the criminal' was the bad guy and tried to capture him.

Rein fought back with all his might.

…

Back with the fight

With their spears extended and enhanced by spells, the spears would immobilize anything if touched by the tip.

3 royal guards made a phalanx like motion and waited for Rein to collide with the spears.

Rein charged at them blindly since his pain was so great.

Rein's former wounds had reopened, plus he had gain additional ones from fighting the royal guard.

"Rein STOP IT! STOP FIGHTING!" Zatch shouted and tried to get away from Yuno's grip, but she wasn't letting go.

Rein leaped over the three royal guards went for their leader.

"And what? Let you rot their!" Rein shouted as he summoned a large energy beast with four arms that went after the leader

"Shit!" The leader shouted as he was engulfed by the spell which created a large explosion

"Damn YOU" one guard shouted out as he stabbed Rein in the back with his spear

"AHH" Rein shouted in pain as the spear went deeper and deeper into his flesh

The other two Royal guards did the same, stabbing Rein with their spears then used spells to completely immobilize him.

Rein collapsed to the floor, not able to move.

"LET ME GO!" Zatch shouted Yuno, Zatch finally was able to rip free of Yuno's grasp and he went running over to Rein only to be stopped by the Royal guard captain who was still somehow alive from the last attack.

"It isn't safe here" The Royal guard told Zatch and picked him up to only throw him back near Yuno.

"Da…damn it…Zatch I'm sorry…I wasn't able to keep my promise" Rein said while in anguish, Rein started to stand up slowly even with the spelled enhanced spears imbedded into his flesh

"Rein please! Stop it! Stop fighting! You'll die!" Zatch shouted in desperation.

The captain walked up to Rein and stabbed him with his spear.

"Stay down, and listen to the boy. If you continue this Rein, you will die, and my men will hold no regrets toward your death" The captain told Rein bluntly.

Rein collapsed to the ground. "I…can't stop…I owe him my LIFE!" Rein shouted.

"You keep on spouting that shit. Even though I know what you are, the people in your village despise you, you care only for yourself, and when things don't go your way you throw rampages just like this one, that boy was forced to save your life because you commanded him too" The captain shouted at Rein.

"THAT's not true!" Zatch shouted in protest.

"Ma 'dam, please bring that boy inside the house, he has no business being here" the captain shouted.

"No!" Zatch shouted as Yuno threw Zatch inside the house and closed the door.

"Zatch! Damn it to HELL! Don't you have any idea what he goes through in there?" Rein shouted at his captures.

"That's not my problem, you're a wild beast, and as such, we must either capture you, or kill you. It's your choice" The Captain threatened.

"This can't be happening…what should I do? They're weakened now, I can take them..." Zeno said almost ready for action. "Wait" Zeno responded then stopped himself. "This…isn't my problem, if I do this…What would Father do?" Zeno asked himself.

"Damn it! You can stop this! You've been around Zatch for longer than I have! Please! Stop this!" Rein shouted at the woods, in Zeno's general direction.

Zeno looked at Rein and was surprised that he was actually being called out.

Before the guards looked at the general direction that Rein was shouting at, the Aura had completely disappeared.

"Ha, this fool is imagining things!" one guard laughed.

"Well he's probably hallucinating with the loss of blood" one guard explained.

_(He…ran away)_ Rein thought in full despair. Rein let out one last howl, as he fell onto the ground in defeat.

The guards had gathered reinforcements and picked up their wounded and took Rein to prison.

Meanwhile with Zeno

"WHY!" Zeno shouted as he unleashed a large lightning blast across the forest, the blast wiped out dozens of trees. "Why…why did I run away?" Zeno asked himself. _(It's not Zatch that's the coward…it's me)_ Zeno told himself.

Zeno started to throw a rampage throughout the entire forest, which created thunder clouds above the entire area.

Zeno kept on unleashing large lightning bolts from the sky and made 60 mile long radius thunder cloud that covered the area, making the afternoon turn into night.

Zeno only stopped once he thought it started raining, but there was no rain coming down from the sky.

Zatch looked out of the window to see nothing but darkness with the sudden out bursts of lightning smashing into the ground.


	8. Chapter 8

Chapter 8 Will POWER!

Authors note: God finally this is coming to a close of the four year stage. After that there will be a few chapters, then I'll finally enter the mamodo battle for king…Thus far it's been mostly a Pov of Zeno's side of the story, which I've been doing on purpose. Oh and did anyone notice that Toonami came back on April first? Dude this better not be a April fool's joke because that would just piss me off to no extent, if you think some of my chapters are dark…I'm not going to go there.

…

The next day came and Zeno had burned down half of the Northern Forest.

Zeno didn't go back to the castle; he had slept in a pile of ashes where a large tree used to stand.

The sun rose which showed a vast swath of land which seemed like it was snowing but it was only ash being picked up by the wind.

Zeno finally woke up and looked around him then covered his face with his hands.

"So it wasn't a dream after all" Zeno muttered to himself. "I…never had that feeling before….I wouldn't even know what to call it." Zeno told himself while being confused about his feelings. "IT feels like regret but it's not, this must be what my instructor told me about…guilt" Zeno said in a low tone.

Zeno picked himself up and dusted himself off, a huge dust cloud was created by doing so.

Zeno looked up into the sky, _(I must be a coward for not helping Zatch when he needed it most)_ Zeno thought.

…

Meanwhile back in the palace, trouble was brewing

The instructor was ordered to the Throne room where the King presides

"My king" The instructor said as he bowed before the king

Mr. Bell sat there on his throne overlooking his subject with a glare of hatred

"How dare you" The king said menacingly

"My…." The instructor was interrupted by a large wave of lightning coursing through his body

"AHHHHH" The instructor shouted in pain as he collapsed to the floor

"Did you honestly think you could keep Zeno's secret from me? What's more is that YOU'RE the reason he now knows where Zatch is!" the king shouted then stood up from his throne

"My king…I only did what I thought was in Zeno's best interest!" The instructor responded

"And who gave you permission to THINK?" Mr. Bell stated with a thunderous tone

Everyone in the Throne room left because they were afraid of what the king might do.

Now being alone with the king, the instructor felt alone.

"I have…been raising and training Zeno since birth" The instructor tried to explain

"So, you feel as if he's yours? It doesn't matter what you feel, I am king, and you are my servant. That means you follow my orders, I NEVER told you to tell Zeno about Zatch!" The king shouted then unleashed a powerful Zakerga into the instructor's chest which sent the mamodo flying into the wall

"GAH" the instructor coughed up blood and slowly fell to the floor

"I will give you one chance to live. Find my son, and bring him back to me. And you're fired after you've completed the mission I've assigned you" The king said then sat back down on the throne

"Thank you my King!" The instructor responded with a scared tone

The instructor ran out of the castle in order to find Zeno, in order to save his own life

…

Back with Zeno

Zeno had made his way out of the forest and had been unknowingly following Zatch's normal schedule.

"Why did I come here?" Zeno asked himself.

Zeno was standing in front of Zatch's favorite fishing spot.

"I'm an idiot, I didn't even try to hide myself" Zeno said, and then looked around him to see he was all alone, which actually disappointed him.

Having nothing else better to do, Zeno zapped the river with a lightning bolt which killed a medium sized fish.

After Zeno finished his breakfast he once again started to walk in no general direction but somehow managed to find himself at the park.

"And again. Why I'm I here?" Zeno asked himself annoyed that he felt as if he were losing control.

"Y…You…your that kid" A voice stuttered

Zeno turned to the voice to see a boy with a duck bill wearing pajamas

"Duck boy?" Zeno responded

"I'm not a duck!" Kanchomé stated

Zeno glared at him which made Kanchomé shudder

"What you want" Zeno asked with an annoyed tone

"Umm, sorry I just thought you were Zatch" Kanchomé responded

Zeno stood silent, for once Zeno didn't mind the misunderstanding.

"Whatever, just try to remember that I wear white, while he wears blue, or are you color blind?" Zeno mocked Kanchomé.

Kanchomé tried to ignore that last statement.

"It's just that I was excited to see you that's all, Zatch didn't come to school today" Kanchomé tried to explain

"Is that so" Zeno replied. _(I wonder where he is?) _Zeno wondered.

Zeno tried to sense out Zatch's aura but couldn't since he wasn't in the area.

"Well he's not here, go look some where's else" Zeno told Kanchomé.

Kanchomé took Zeno's advice and started to walk away until two bigger kids spotted Kanchomé and who they thought was Zatch…

Zeno started to walk the opposite way until he heard sobbing coming from behind him.

The two kids were picking on Kanchomé for some unknown reason.

_(It's not my problem)_ Zeno told himself as he started to walk away, but stopped. Zeno looked at Kanchomé's situation and found it very similar with Zatch's.

"What you going to do about it, no one will help you" the kid said as he pushed Kanchomé around.

_Kanchome_ looked at Zeno as if he would do something.

_(Will I keep telling myself this every time? Plus they're looking right at me, wouldn't it be cowardly if I didn't do anything?)_ Zeno asked himself.

"See, even your weakling friend Zatch won't even help you" The kid laughed

"HEY morons! Are you stupid or just color blind?" Zeno shouted at the two

Zeno only got pissed off that he was mistaken for Zatch, AGAIN.

_(Shit I just involved myself in this situation)_ Zeno laughed a little while thinking about it.

"You got some guts talking to us like that Zatch" the kids mocked as they walked up to Zeno

"Again you idiots just called me Zatch, get it through your thick skulls that I'M NOT that cowardly, crybaby, weakling…" Zeno was cut off by the other child punching Zeno straight in the face.

"How's that?" The kid mocked

Zeno wiped his mouth and glared at the boy.

"You're so freaking dead" Zeno growled as he grabbed the two kids by the throats and choke slammed them into the ground.

The kids coughed and choked in pain.

"Does it look like I'm in the mood to be toyed with? And stop calling me by MY BROTHER'S NAME!" Zeno shouted as he picked the kids up and choke slammed them into the ground one more time.

Zeno let the kids go and went and sat on a bench to cool his head.

_(Ha, I guess I must be the bully, beating the crap out of those weaker than me)_ Zeno laughed a little

"So…that makes sense now!" Kanchomé said as he walked back over to Zeno.

"I told you to go away" Zeno responded

"But…you saved me" Kanchomé responded

"I didn't save you, they called me Zatch, and I got mad. That's it, so leave me alone" Zeno demanded

Kanchomé didn't listen to Zeno and sat next beside him

Zeno glared at Kanchomé

"No wonder why they pick on you, you don't listen to superiority" Zeno said in an annoyed tone

"But you…you said you were Zatch's brother" Kanchomé stated

_(He's just now realizing that? What an idiot)_ Zeno thought and laughed. (Should I wipe his memory now that he knows though?) Zeno actually considered the proposition.

"I've never seen Zatch play with you before, do you play at home?" Kanchomé asked

(He's annoying, but Zatch is going to find out either way…right?) Zeno wondered and completely ignored Kanchomé

"So you must know where Zatch is now right, you're his brother" Kanchomé stated

"Shut up" Zeno responded

"Wait…now that I think about it, you're pretty strong, why didn't you do that for Zatch like you did for me?" Kanchomé asked again

"Shut up!" Zeno yelled with a hint of anger

"Do you and Zatch…" Kanchomé was interrupted by Zeno dealing a fast and powerful punch to his ribs which sent him hurdling into the bushes.

Kanchomé let out a gasp of pain as he lost his breathe and nearly lost conciseness, Kanchomé didn't even try to get up, he just laid there.

Zeno then braced himself as near moments later the bench he was sitting on had collapsed beneath him

Zeno was sent to the floor as he felt 30 times heavier than normal.

Zeno slowly stood back up but it got even more difficult as the weight on his shoulders got more intense.

"…Wh…who's there?" Zeno said as his voice started to get warped because of the gravitational field around him.

Zeno was met with even more gravity pressing down on him

Zeno felt as if his body weighed 100 times more than normal.

"Coward! Show you self!" Zeno shouted as he aimed his and in the air and unleashed a powerful Zaker that displaced the gravitational field allowing him to escape

Zeno jumped back 10 yards then sensed a evil presence behind a tree and aimed at it

Zeno let out a powerful Zakerga at the tree

The tree exploded with a large mass of dark energy coming at the condense lightning blast

Both spells met and cancelled each other out

Zeno got a good look at his attacker and it was Brago

"Attacking from behind, didn't take you for a coward" Zeno mocked Brago

"First time we met, you surprise attack me, then run away. I think I'm going to KILL YOU" Brago laughed while he took an aggressive stance

Zeno tried thinking back

"Oh the food fight, yeah that was fun" Zeno laughed

"Bastard I got suspended because of you!" Brago shouted as he shot 3 Reis spells at Zeno

Zeno dodged two of them and destroyed the last with a medium size Zaker.

_(I have too much going on in my mind for this type of battle)_ Zeno thought while knowing this was going to be a difficult fight, even by his standards. "I usually don't do this sort of thing, but I forgive you for attacking me, so let's call it a truce" Zeno stated and was about to walk away until whips of energy slung at him.

Zeno quickly dodged the attack and gained distance from his attacker.

"You're not running away again you COWARD!" Brago shouted at Zeno and unleashed a massive spell which looked like a giant Gigano Reis, but had small slashes of energy running through it.

"Dioga Gravidon!" Brago shouted when the massive sphere of gravitational energy went streaking toward Zeno

Zeno stopped walking away when he heard the word 'coward'.

"I'm not a coward!" Zeno shot back then summoned a large yo-yo which had lightning blades coming out of the middle of it, the spell started spinning at a high speed and it clashed with Brago's.

Zeno withdrew his yo-yo and made it hit Brago's spell from the right side which caused Brago's spell to be ripped in half.

Zeno again withdrew his yo-yo spell and made it go after Brago

(I'm not a coward! I'm not! I never ran away…) Zeno tried to convince himself but thought about Zatch and yesterday's events.

Zeno distracted himself not realizing that Brago used another strong gravity spell that sent his Yo-yo spell straight into the ground which cancelled it out.

"Shit" Zeno said then countered by sending a powerful Zaker at Brago

Brago defended by sending a powerful Reis which cancelled out Zeno's attack.

_(I'm getting nowhere with this guy)_ Zeno thought

"You're stronger than I expected for a coward, a person who has power and runs away is unbefitting of that power" Brago stated

Those words stung deep into Zeno's heart as he thought about Baou

_(Is…that why I wasn't given Baou, was it my fault?) _Zeno thought to himself as he started to become less engaged with the battle at hand.

"Don't ignore me!" Brago shouted as he closed in on Zeno and sent a direct Reis spell into Zeno's stomach

Zeno was sent flying 30 yards across the field and hit the ground hard

Zeno took in a few deep breaths trying to regain his breathe which had been knocked out from the spell.

"Damn…it" Zeno growled as he stood back up and brushed himself off.

"I'm going to enjoy this" Brago said with a evil grin

"I don't have time for you" Zeno shouted as he charged Brago at full force and started with a barrage of kicks and punches

Brago either blocked or dodged them

Zeno then enveloped his hands in lightning as he made swiping motions at Brago

Brago countered using a dark like energy that covered his hands.

Both Zeno and Brago punched each other with all of their might which sent the both of them flying in opposite directions

Both Zeno and Brago jumped back up on their feet almost instantly

"I deserve my power! I trained my entire life perfecting it! So don't confuse me with HIM!" Zeno shouted at Brago while unleashing a massive and powerful lightning blast

Brago responded by creating a powerful gravity field that made the earth itself cave in on its self, making a large swath of land completely disappear

Zeno's spell was overtaking by the spell and cancelled out.

The field kept on increasing until the park itself seemed like it was going to be destroy again, but Zeno noticed that Kanchomé still had not gotten up and was about to be caught in the attack.

For some odd reason Zeno instantly teleported over to Kanchomé and threw him another 100 yards away from the battle field

"You should be worried about yourself" Brago stated as he stopped his spell and was now charging Zeno again.

"He was in my way" Zeno responded simply.

Zeno stopped Brago's charge by sending a medium size Zaker at Brago which made direct contact.

Brago was nearly forced to the ground but retook his stance, and was ready to keep on fighting.

"Your attacks are weak" Brago mocked

Zeno frowned, _(It's my first spell…)_ Zeno thought while being annoyed by Brago constantly teasing him.

"I'll show you how weak you truly are!" Zeno shouted

"I'll tear you limb from limb you brat" Brago shouted while using a very strong gravitational field that started to crush the landscape around Zeno.

In order to protect himself, Zeno used his cloak like an umbrella.

It felt like the mamodo planet itself was shaking over the dramatic fight that was pursing

_(How did I get myself into this? I didn't even want to fight…this time)_ Zeno thought to himself as he looked above him to see a warping air above him.

Brago's hand darkened with energy and the weight above Zeno's head increased

"Gah…" Zeno coughed as his cloak nearly collapsed

"Do…don't think you can beat me so easily" Zeno shouted but his voice didn't reach Brago.

"Die already" Brago growled as he increased the spell's intensity

Zeno's cloak soon collapsed and Zeno was smashed into the ground along with the surrounding area.

_(I…I was just over powered! Damn it…)_ Zeno thought as he felt his body being crushed.

Brago increased the intensity of his spell to the max, and the area around the spell caved in under it's own weight.

_(Is it because I'm too weak? Do I need more power? Do I need Baou to beat a simpleton? Damn it to hell!)_ Zeno thought in agony.

"What a waste of my time" Brago stated as he felt Zeno's presence disappear.

Brago stopped his spell and lowered his hand and started to walk away until a large intense lightning bolt came from out of the ground.

"I don't need Baou to beat you! I can beat anyone! I am Zeno the lightning prince, and I'll be damned if I were made a fool of by a stupid brute!" Zeno proclaimed as he raised his hand into the air and summoned a large circular goddess with 5 lightning bolts in the front.

"A stupid brute? I'll freaking kill you!" Brago responded as he launched a massive dark sphere that had smaller dark sphere's in it.

"Diborudo Jii Gravidon" Brago stated as the massive spell went charging toward Zeno

"Jigadirasu Uru Zakerga" Zeno responded, Zeno's spell let out a massive Zakerga

Both spells clashed head on which created a loud and deafening shockwave.

_(If I can beat him, I can beat anyone!)_ Zeno thought to himself as he released all of his energy into his strongest spell.

Zeno's spell unleashed an extra boost of condense lightning that managed to push Brago's spell further back.

"This can't be! I'm BRAGO! I cannot lose!" Brago shouted as he pushed his strength to his limits.

Jiga let out a roar that sounded much like its own name.

The powerful and massive Zakerga breached the outer shell of Brago's spell then soon split it apart and the spell went screaming at an insane speed toward Brago.

Brago braced himself as he was enveloped in the massive blast.

Once again the entire park was taken out, Zeno looked exhausted, and Kanchomé was playing dead.\

Zeno slowly walked to where Kanchomé was.

"Hey…Get up" Zeno ordered as he kicked Kanchomé in the ribs.

Kanchomé coughed a little then sat up right. "Is it over?" Kanchomé asked in a cowardly fashion.

"Yeah, and no thanks to you" Zeno mocked

"Y…You actually beat Brago!" Kanchomé said in a shock voice

"You act like I wasn't capable" Zeno said then glared at Kanchomé

Zeno then thought for a moment and started to walk away.

"Where you going?" Kanchomé responded

"To take care of something that's been bothering me" Zeno responded

Zeno then teleported out of sight

Kanchomé freaked out because of his sudden disappearance.

Zeno teleported in front of Yuno's home.

All was quiet, too quiet.

Zeno grinned a little; he nonchalantly walked up to the front door and stood in front of it wondering how he was going to enter.

_(Should I use the front door? No I'm too cool for that)_ Zeno thought as he backed away from the door.

Zeno walked five paces to the right and aimed his hand at the house, his hand soon started to glow a slight bluish hue.

A small lightning burst soon smashed through the house making a five by five foot hole in the wall.

On the other side

Yuno was sitting down on her couch, reading a book to herself.

Zatch was on the floor, and Yuno was using him as a foot rest.

The sudden blast and the wood being splintered stunned everyone in the room.

"Now that's an entrance!" Zeno laughed as he jumped through the hole to see Yuno standing behind Zatch, and Zatch was cowering in fear of what was happening.

"What the fuck are you doing you son of a bitch!" Yuno shouted as she still didn't get a good look at the intruder.

Zeno glared at her then used a small lightning shockwave to clear away the smoke and debris.

Both Zatch and Yuno got a good look at who was inside the house.

A boy with silver hair, purple eyes, and looked almost identical to Zatch.

"You know who I am, surely you will remember this face" Zeno said with an evil smile

Yuno looked horrified

Zatch was still stunned and almost fell into a daze for he thought he was dreaming.

"My name is Zeno! And I came here to claim what is rightfully Mine!" Zeno shouted as he aimed his hand at both Zatch and Yuno.

Yuno picked Zatch up, but not to protect him.

Yuno put Zatch in a position to use him as a human shield.

"Zeno…" Zatch muttered

A small lighting circle appeared in front of Zeno's hand.

Multiple Zakerugas came out of the circle and went charging toward Yuno and Zatch…

A small frown formed on Zeno's face right before the moment of impact.


	9. Chapter 9

Chapter 9 The Choice

Authors note: I got nothing to say! Except for sorry that it takes me so freaking long to update these stories! I was planning on this update so Long ago!

Back with the story

With a second's regret, Zeno quickly opened up his hand, which forced the Zakerugas to spread out.

The spreading of the spell caused each of the condensed lightning blasts to hit all of Yuno's limbs simultaneously.

The force was so great the Yuno went flying through the wall, and out of the house.

Zatch flew out of Yuno's grip and remained relatively unscathed, and he fell to the ground.

_(…Wasn't I supposed to kill them both?)_ Zeno thought as he looked at his brother.

Zatch looked at Zeno with a teary eyed face

"What you looking at?" Zeno responded as he walked past Zatch

Zeno walked out of the other new hole he had made by using Yuno as a bulldozer.

(I'm still angry! I can't stop shaking!) Zeno thought to himself as he grabbed his right arm to try and stop it from shaking, but it didn't work.

Yuno started to cough up blood as all of her limbs were nearly torn off.

Zeno aimed his hand at Yuno and was about to finish her off, his hand started glowing.

And Yuno could start to see flashbacks of her life flash before her eyes.

"STOP!" A voice cried out

Zeno turned around to see Zatch crying.

"Please…don't" Zatch cried

"What?" Zeno was confused

"She didn't do anything wrong! Please stop!" Zatch cried

This infuriated Zeno, he clenched his hands and started walking toward Zatch.

"Do you take me for a fool!" Zeno shouted as he grabbed Zatch by the neck and lifted him off the ground.

Zatch still quiet comprehend what was going on.

After all, some kid just blew up their house.

"Wh…Who are you?" Zatch asked, but deep inside he already knew the answer.

"Who am I? I know you sleep all day during class, but you can't be that stupid" Zeno mocked as he dropped Zatch to the floor.

"So…you're my brother" Zatch said as he sat on the ground

Zeno stood there for a moment wondering if he should confirm the question.

"Regrettably…yes" Zeno stated

Zatch looked around in horror, everything was nearly destroyed. The house itself nearly collapsed due to Zeno's spells

_(He must view me as a monster)_ Zeno thought, he was a little happy at that fact, but sad at the same time.

"So…where's mother! Where's father!" Zatch asked excitedly

Zeno gave Zatch a weird look

"They're not your mother, or father" Zeno responded simply then started to walk out of the house…but he didn't use the door, Zeno simply made another hole in the wall that lead outside.

Zatch forgot about the half dead Yuno and followed Zeno.

Zeno quickly noticed this but tried to ignore it.

Zeno teleported himself to a small hill that had a good view of the northern forest

Zeno turned around then freaked out as Zatch was right in his face.

"What the!" Zeno freaked out as his head nearly bumped into his younger brother's head.

"Whao! How did we get here?" Zatch asked astonished

_(He grabbed onto my cloak)_ Zeno thought, Zeno clenched his fists then punched his brother on the top of his head.

"OUCH" Zatch cried as he covered his head

"I wanted to get away from you" Zeno growled, Zeno started to walk away but found it more difficult than usual

Zeno looked down to see Zatch lying on the ground and holding his legs

"Don't leave" Zatch begged

"I don't know you, and you don't know me! So leave me alone!" Zeno yelled as he started shaking his legs.

Zatch flew off Zeno's legs and landed on the ground pretty hard.

"Unu…but you know me…and" Zatch said then sat upright. "This isn't the first time we've met! That…was you…at the hospital" Zatch stated

Zeno glared at him, "How…guess you're not dumb after all" Zeno stated as he sat down and looked at the sun.

"So…can we go home now?" Zatch asked politely

Zeno head snapped toward his way, "No" Zeno responded quickly.

"But…we're family" Zatch started to cry

"I don't care, you're a thief" Zeno tried to explain. _(Damn it, he won't understand, he doesn't even know about Baou!)_ Zeno thought and covered his face with his hands.

Zatch used that chance to inch his way closer to Zeno.

Zeno put his hands back down to notice that Zatch was sitting right next to him…

Instinctively, Zeno pushed Zatch away as far as he could with his arm distance.

"Let's get this straight, I don't like you" Zeno stated coldly

"B…you were protecting me, from her" Zatch stated

Zeno thought about it for a moment and couldn't come up with an answer.

"Shut up, she just pissed me off!" Zeno responded then got back up to his feet. "Just stay away from me, you're a weakling and a coward! You needed ME to do YOUR work!" Zeno shouted at Zatch.

Zatch backed away from Zeno because of those hurtful comments.

"But…you're my big bro…we're supposed to help each other" Zatch said almost in tears, but he didn't want to cry.

"Damn it Zeno, you didn't" A voice shouted and the figure came running up the hill.

Both Zeno and Zatch turned over to see an adult with armor, with a spear hooked on his back coming toward them.

"Daddy?" Zatch responded hopefully

"No stupid, that's my instructor" Zeno pointed out

"You idiot, didn't I tell you not to meet Zatch until your vacation was OVER!" The instructor shouted

"He's still alive isn't he? So shut up" Zeno responded

Zatch was confused about what they were talking about.

The instructor stood in front of the boys, and gave Zeno a very saddened look.

Zeno noticed this straight away.

"What's wrong?" Zeno asked

"Your…father…he knows Zeno, and he wants me to bring you home" The instructor told Zeno

"Home!" Zatch yelled excitedly, Zatch nearly started jumping up and down.

Zeno looked down at the ground at near shock and fear.

"Can I go with you! Please, please, please!" Zatch begged

"No" Both the Instructor and Zeno responded

"I…can't go back, I…don't want too" Zeno tried to explain

"I have no choice, it's a direct order…or death" The instructor stated

"Death! I won't let him do such a thing!" Zeno shouted in protest.

"You don't need to get so upset Zeno. Let's go…home" The instructor sighed

"Nuu why can't I come with you!" Zatch cried

"Because I don't like you" Zeno retorted

"We have our reasons" The instructor corrected Zeno.

The instructor started to leave with Zeno following in his tracks

"Zeno!" Zatch called out

Zeno didn't look back.

"I'M Sorry!" Zatch cried out

Zeno stopped for a moment

"I…don't know what I did…to make you not like me, but I'm sorry!" Zatch cried out

"Save your tears! They won't help anyone!" Zeno shouted back at Zatch then walked away.

"Are you sure about this Zeno? This day will most likely be your last opportunity to spend time with your brother" The instructor tried to explain

"All I wanted was answers, and I got most of them. I never wanted a brother…and I'll never get Baou, so there's no point in trying" Zeno told his instructor

"You've gained all of that huh?...well that's….decent I suppose" The instructor sort of teased Zeno

Zatch was left behind, wondering what he should do…

While Zeno and his instructor walked back to the castle

…

…

Back with Zeno at the palace gates

"Teacher…what should I tell father?" Zeno asked his instructor

The instructor looked down at Zeno, _(he's going to learn soon, so I should be the one to tell him)_ the Instructor thought. "Don't call me that anymore Zeno" The Ex. Instructor told Zeno

"What do you mean?" Zeno asked

"…I was fired" The Ex. Instructor stated then pushed Zeno through the palace doors, which lead into the throne room.

"Wait what!" Zeno shouted the man

"**ZENO**" A loud thunderous voice shouted

Zeno turned to the throne to see his father.

Zeno couldn't help but shudder

"…Father" Zeno slightly whimpered

"I told you not to mention Zatch ever again" Mr. Bell stated with an angry tone.

"I didn't do anything….wrong" Zeno responded

"Don't talk back to me!" Mr. Bell roared. His body started to charge up with electricity.

Zeno's body started to shake suddenly.

"All I wanted was answers" Zeno tried to explain. "How else was I supposed to find out who Zatch was?" Zeno stated while trying to stand up for himself.

"I told you not to mention his name" Mr. Bell yelled. Soon after he launched a Zaker at Zeno which hit him directly

Zeno screamed in pain but stood his ground.

"You act as if he doesn't exist…I still don't understand! Why! YOU'RE putting us through all this!" Zeno shouted at his father.

In return Zeno was met with another powerful Zaker that sent him to his knees.

Zeno started to breathe heavily

"My lord please, Zeno never harmed his younger brother. Plus you gave him a vacation to do whatever he pleased" The instructor stated while walking in front of Zeno to be his shield from any more punishment.

"There was a reason why I separated them in the first place. I shall do whatever I think is best for my children" Mr. Bell responded in a calmer manner.

"My lord" The instructor said while kneeling down

"Get out of my sight, I believe I told you not to come back here ever again" Mr. Bell demanded

Zeno's instructor stood up and dropped his spear to the ground and started to walk out of the castle doors.

"Wait! Why, why punish him? I ordered him to do it!" Zeno exclaimed

"Your punishment is not yet over Zeno, and as for him…be glad that he's still alive" Mr. Bell explained

"You're taking him too…" Zeno mumbled as he felt a void grow larger in his heart.

"I shall appoint you a new teacher, one that meets with My regulations" Mr. Bell stated then left his throne room.

Zeno's Ex Instructor left the castle without anything to say, he never looked back.

Zeno was left alone inside the dark throne room wondering what to do.


	10. Chapter 10

Chapter 10 Heads Start Rolling

Authors note: did anyone notice that I usually choose titles of the chapter that actually relates to the story? Oh, and I have no idea how Foster homes actually work, and I'm too lazy to look it up on the web. So I'm just going to wing it for the beginning of this chapter. Even if I did know how it worked, the process, I'm pretty sure wouldn't fit inside this chapter. So forgive me if I insult anyone, Thanks for Understanding! Oh and I'm now telling Zeno's instructor's name, because he's no one's instructor he lost the right to be called one…so now he has a real name.

…

20 days after Zeno broke inside of Yuno's house and nearly killed her.

…

Zeno's Ex Instructor was inside of office building looking for a job.

"My name is Xavier. I've worked for the King for over 300 years. Responsibility is my Forte, I may be strict but I am also kind. I've been a child's training instructor for approximately 4 years. I would really appreciate it if I could have this job, so thank you for the time you took interviewing me" Xavier explained to an employer of Foster homes.

"The King? You had such a perfect job, why did you leave it?" The employer asked

"…Let's just say, I got sick of all of the rules and I'm looking for a different way to live my life" Xavier explained

The Employer was a little confused about Xavier's answer but didn't question it.

…

12 days later

The Employers of the foster homes decided to give Xavier a chance

Xavier came walking inside of the office without his usual armor; he was wearing a business suit.

"I'm glad that you came" The Employer stated

Xavier sat down in a chair ready to hear if he could actually get a job.

"We've had a couple applications open up. Most recently we need a temporary fill in for a child named Zatch Bell" The Employer stated then handed Xavier a picture of Zatch.

_(What kind of joke is this? Zatch Bell! Either this is the King's doing, or this must be FATE!)_ Xavier thought in near disbelief. "What do you mean by temporary?" Xavier asked

"About a month ago, Zatch Bell's foster mother was attacked, and she hasn't been…in the right frame of mind to raise a child" The Employer explained.

"I see…" Xavier responded_. (Damn Zeno you fucked Yuno up)_ Xavier thought then had to contain his laughter. "So how long will I be able to watch over Zatch?" Xavier asked

"Until Yuno recovers" The Employer responded. "It's just a test, and then we'll see if we can put you into a more permanent job." The Employer explained. "So will you take the job?" The employer asked.

"So…where is he now?" Xavier responded

"You will find the boy at his original home. The Address is…" The Employer was interrupted by Xavier

"I will go get the kid and bring him to my home" Xavier stated then started to walk out of the room.

"Wait! You don't even know where he lives" The Employer responded

"I'll find my way" Xavier said quietly

About an hour later Xavier walked to Yuno's house which still had 3 large holes in the walls. There was Dry blood splattered near the second hole of the house.

"Zatch are you here?" Xavier yelled throughout the house.

"Coming!" Zatch responded, Zatch came running out of his room with a small book bag on his back.

As Zatch got a good look at who was standing in front of him, Zatch gasped and nearly jumped out of his shoes.

"You're Zeno's teacher! Does that mean I can see my big brother?" Zatch asked with an excited attitude.

Xavier ignored Zatch's questions. "I'm going to be your care taker until Yuno regains her health." Xavier explained, and then he exited the house through one of the large holes.

"Please can I see Zeno?" Zatch asked while still standing inside of the house.

"Are you coming or not? You don't want to be left behind." Xavier stated while now walking in the direction of his home.

Zatch quickly caught up to Xavier and followed right behind him.

"So what's your name?" Zatch asked

"…Xavier" Xavier stated his name.

Zatch then began to try and make up a song about Xavier's name.

Xavier lead Zach into the mamodo capital and into a large apartment complex which was located to the west of the big city.

Xavier's apartment was 3 floors up, and room 306. The apartment had only 2 bedrooms, the living room was also part of the kitchen, and it had 1 bathroom. There was hardly any furniture, 1 couch in the living room, and only 1 bed and dresser inside of the master's bedroom. The smaller bedroom was totally empty.

"Umm so where do I sleep?" Zatch asked while looking around the apartment.

"You can have my bed tonight, because I got work to do later" Xavier responded

"Unu, really!" Zatch said happily

_(He's pretty easy to amuse) _Xavier thought to himself. "Yeah" Xavier responded simply

For the rest of the day, Xavier took care of Zatch, made him lunch and dinner. Gave him a bath, even helped him with school work. Xavier never mentioned Zeno, or about why he had very little cash, or did he talk all that much. All of which was totally new to Zatch.

Later at night, Xavier told Zatch to go to bed.

"Xavier…" Zatch said while hopping into the double sized spring mattress

"What?" Xavier responded while going inside his closet to pull out his Royal guard armor.

There were five different sets of armor. One was a Royal Guard's armor. The other set was the set that Zatch had seen him in the first time, it looked like it was just light armor. The third set looked like heavy battle armor which would have encased Xavier's entire body. The fourth set wasn't even made out of metal; it was just light black leather. But the one that actually scared Zatch was a Armor set that had Metal blades jutting from the shoulders, one blade coming out of the head, and mamodo skulls tied to the belt, the armor looked like it had formed scars even from previous battles.

"Don't ever go in this closet" Xavier warned while he put on a Royal Guard's attire.

"Where you going?" Zatch asked a little worried

Xavier smiled a little; "I'm a Royal Guard now, and it's my shift" Xavier lied to Zatch

"So cool!" Zatch responded

"Go to bed" Xavier told Zatch

"Xavier! I really like it here" Zatch told Xavier. "I…I don't want to leave" Zatch stated.

"Don't worry about it." Xavier responded then left the room.

Xavier soon left the apartment and locked the door before heading out on his personal mission.

"I'll put wheels of Fate into motion even if I must force it" Xavier told himself as he stepped out into the dark streets of the mamodo apartment complex. He slammed his hand against the ground and summoned a large spear with broad sided tip.

Xavier then used another spell that summoned 1000's of see through orbs.

"Give me sight" Xavier demanded of his spell as he then created around 20 larger orbs that could see everything the other smaller 1000's of orbs seen. "Scatter!" Xavier demanded the 1000's of orbs.

"Find her" Xavier ordered his spell.

The 1000's of countless floating orbs went flying throughout the city and throughout the country side

Xavier was trying to keep constant watch of all of his orbs, seeing what they seen, mapping out every single guard and police man out on the streets.

First Xavier checked all of the hospitals to find his target, but came up empty.

Then they went around every single insane asylum throughout a 300 mile radius.

"No one can hide from my ultimate eye" Xavier proclaimed

Within a matter of 6 minutes Xavier found his target.

5 different orbs was circling a particular room which was located inside an Insane Asylum which was located east in the mamodo capital.

The orbs shown a clear image of an old woman which looked like she had scars on both of her shoulders, brownish hair, and vague like eyes.

_(In order for my plan to work, first I must Kill Yuno) _Xavier thought to himself. "Dissipate" Xavier ordered his orbs.

Seconds later, both the large orbs and the 1000's of smaller orbs disappeared

Xavier then jumped onto the roof tops and began his journey over to the East side of the capital.

With him going top speed, Xavier soon reached Yuno's location within 5 minutes.

The Asylum was actually pretty well guarded, large stone walls surrounded the building, and iron gates insured it's security.

There was only 4 Royal Guards protecting its walls.

_(I wonder if they will just let me through?)_ Xavier wondered, Xavier covered his face up using the steal helmet.

Xavier boldly walked straight up to the front gate trying to pretend that he was a Royal Guard soldier

"Holt!" The Captain of the four man team responded

"I need passage, it's urgent" Xavier explained while keeping his cool.

"No one is allowed through" The Captain stated then blocked Xavier's path.

"What business do you have here?" One of the Royal Guard asked

"I'm a simple messenger, who bears a urgent message for the warden of this complex" Xavier lied

"Show us the letter, and we'll deliver it to him" The third Guard responded

"I can't do that…" Xavier stated while it started to become clear that his cover would soon be blown.

"You can't? You are you? What's your department?" The captain questioned while walking closer to Xavier

_(I…guess it couldn't be helped)_ Xavier thought as a frown grew across his face. "I'll ask one more time…let me through" Xavier demanded

"Or what? We are under the orders of the King, to not let anyone through" The Captain stated

"I can care less about that" Xavier responded

"You WHAT!" The Captain shouted as instantly lifted up Xavier's helmet which revealed Xavier's face. "Shit…" The Captain said in fear for he knew who Xavier was

"Captain?" One of the Guards responded

The Captain backed away, and Xavier put his helmet back on which meant the other three guards didn't know who Xavier really was.

"Get out of MY WAY!" Xavier shouted as he pulled out his spear.

"Retreat!" The Captain ordered as he tried to pull out a spell enhanced sword but was cut down instantly by Xavier's insane speed.

"Captain!" The 3 Guards yelled out

The three Guards then lunged themselves at Xavier

Xavier's spear tip started to spin at an insane speed and it look like drill tip.

"Sorry…" Xavier said right before using a speed enhancement spell and disappearing right before the 3 Royal Guards to only reappear right behind them

"AHHHH" The three Guards screamed in pain as they were knocked out cold.

"Be thankful that you didn't see my face…or I would have had to kill you" Xavier stated as he marched right through the front gates.

He Left the 3 Guards with their lives. but leaving the Captain of the group dead.

Xavier soon found his way to Yuno's room, the door locked.

Xavier took in a deep breath, but didn't back away.

He easily destroyed the door which revealed Yuno still awake and even more scared then before.

"Who…Who are YOU!" Yuno screamed but then a small clear less orb went flying into her mouth to keep her quiet.

"I suppose Zeno has punished you enough…but this isn't about punishment. If you become well again, you will be given Zatch. I for one cannot allow that if this plan is to succeed, so you must die" Xavier explained with a cold tone.

Yuno tried mumbling something before she started to use a wind element spell.

Before the spell had time to even take shape, Xavier quickly thrust his spear into Yuno's throat which nearly lopped off her head.

"Time for the second phase" Xavier said quietly as he took his spear out of Yuno's throat which caused her head to fall to the ground, seconds later Yuno's body dropped to the floor with blood coming out of the lifeless corpse, the heart was still beating…

…

The next day Zatch woke up to find his door opened up slightly, Zatch got up out of bed to see if Xavier was inside the house.

"Xavier?" Zatch said quietly while walking out of the master's bedroom

"Breakfast is ready" Xavier said calmly as he handed Zatch a plate of eggs and bacon

"Unu, Thanks!" Zatch said happily

…

Authors note: I was planning on making this chapter longer, and going into the second phase of Xavier's plan, but I have class very soon, and I couldn't finish it in time. SO Next time, Xavier's second phase will begin!


	11. Chapter 11

Chapter 11 Break Out

Authors Note: Can anyone guess to why Xavier wants to keep Zatch so badly? AND NO it's not as simple as he wants Zeno to meet Zatch…it's much more complex than that. But you will have to wait until chapter 12 to find out what it really is. Oh and I had to kill Yuno, 1) she basically still had custody of Zatch, 2) I freaking hate Yuno. Oh and I showed that Xavier does have a dark side, he's willing to kill to achieve his goal…whatever it may be.

Explanation: I created a new sort of deals trade in the mamodo world. It's the ability to somewhat transfer a little bit of the mamodo's powers into objects with a certain symbol that reads off the certain spell. If the user of the object can pour enough energy into the symbol then they will be able to cast "almost" the full potential of that spell, but it wouldn't be quite as strong as the original. Energy can also be stored into the symbols to act like traps or other sorts of alarm systems. If the symbol in anyway is tampered with or morphed or worse destroyed then the power lying within the symbol will be lost, and it will go back to its original owner. And there's a fundamental rule, one Object, one specific spell.

I'm using this for future reference, also for if anyone gets confused. This of course _**ONLY**_ works in the Mamodo world. Thanks for reading.

…

3 days later, and the Foster Care system found out Yuno had been killed. They had given Xavier full custody to watch over Zatch Bell, plus another paycheck to get them started.

…

Zatch had a blank and nearly void face…

"Well what do you think?" Xavier asked

"It….It's…Haunted!" Zatch cried out as he hid behind Xavier

"Come on Zatch, it doesn't look that bad…" Xavier said then looked at the house he had already bought.

The house had 2 floors, 4 bedrooms, 1 whole kitchen, a spacious living room, and a decent sized bathroom. The house's paint job was nothing but bare wood. The wood on the house looked rotten; all of the windows were broken out. The porch leading to the front door looked like a death trap since it looked like you would fall through it if you step on it. It had a wrecked roof. The only thing decent inside the house was its new pluming system and its energy system which supplied light inside the house during night.

"Why do you want to live here?" Zatch asked

"Because it's 50 miles north of the mamodo Capital, and 5 miles away from any other town or city." Xavier explained

"Then what school will I go to?" Zatch responded

"School? I can home school you, I used to do it…" Xavier stopped. _(I used to do it for Zeno)_ Xavier thought to himself.

"Who…will I play with?" Zatch asked again

_(He asks a lot of questions)_ Xavier thought. "There's some families nearby, I'm sure they have kids around your age" Xavier responded, and then picked Zatch up.

"What, what you doing?" Zatch yelled as he realized Xavier was heading toward the broken down house.

"At least go inside!" Xavier responded

"NO! It's haunted, look at it! It's howling!" Zatch cried and struggled to get down.

The house was making weird noises, but it was just the wind passing through all of the broken windows.

"Stop being such a scary cat" Xavier teased Zatch.

Xavier stepped onto the front porch and fell through to his waist height. Xavier was holding Zatch in the air.

"You ok?" Zatch asked a little worried.

"Never better, this house has a lot of work to do" Xavier sighed.

…

5 hours later. Xavier used some glue and plastic and of course SPELLS to do most of his work to fix up the house to make it look "Almost" habitable. The widows were fixed, and the rotten wood was quickly replaced, Zatch helped out by painting his own room the way he liked it. But of course the rest of the house still had no paint, so Zatch was still slightly freighted to walk around the house; the only place where he really felt safe was his own room.

While the floating Orbs were covered in paint, and rolling themselves across walls.

Xavier was preparing for the final part of his plan.

"Well, I got Zatch for good, and now I got a decent hideout which was the second stage…" Xavier told himself as he hid away his armor sets inside the new bedroom.

"Xavier, Xavier!" Zatch called out and ran into Xavier's room

"What is it Zatch?" Xavier responded

Zatch was already messy, he had dry orange and red paint splattered across his cloak, the back of his head was stained with white paint since he had leaned against to a wet wall.

"I made dinner!" Zatch said excitedly

Xavier's face went blank

_(I didn't even have time to put the food in the fridge. Wait, does…he know how to cook?)_ Xavier wondered as he looked at the blond haired child

"Come on" Zatch responded to Xavier's blank face, and grabbed his hand to pull him to the kitchen.

The kitchen was still bare, except for the huge mess Zatch had made trying to dig out all of the cooking utensils, and spices.

On the square kitchen was two plates of food which appeared to be Yellow Tail, Xavier couldn't tell for sure.

"I caught them myself!" Zatch explained then started to eat his cook yellowtail, Zatch looked like he was enjoying his meal.

(Well…it doesn't look like a prank…) Xavier thought then sat down.

The aromas of the cooked Yellowtail smelt strange, with various kinds of spices that Xavier couldn't point out. "Umm, Zatch…how many spices did you use?" Xavier asked

"All of them" Zatch responded while still eating.

Xavier looked behind him to see around 30 different containers holding spices.

_(Shit)_ Xavier thought while almost smack his own face, but resisted.

"Well do you like it?" Zatch asked

Xavier slowly took a bite of Zatch's home cooked meal.

The taste made his gag reflex take over, and Xavier nearly spat out his food, but Zatch was staring so he didn't.

_(This…is terrible…I really need to show him how to cook.)_ Xavier thought, and to his horror Zatch encouraged him to eat more._ (He'll eat anything that's yellowtail)_ Xavier sighed.

"Hey Zatch get me some water" Xavier requested

"Unu" Zatch turned away to the sink.

In an Anime like fashion Xavier quickly threw his plate of food out the window before Zatch noticed anything.

"Wow, you ate that quickly" Zatch said as he gave Xavier a glass of water.

Xavier looked at the clock; it was 7:30 pm.

_(Zeno's curfew is about up…I better get going if I even have a chance of this succeeding)_ Xavier thought then looked at Zatch. "Zatch, you're going to have to go to bed early today, alright?" Xavier said politely while not trying to raise suspicion.

"Huh? But why?" Zatch asked in response

"Because…I have work to do…" Xavier responded simply then he started to lead Zatch to his room which was pitch black inside.

"I don't wanna" Zatch complained

"How about this. I have a very big surprise to show you tomorrow…can you honestly just stay up and wait? Or wouldn't it be easier to just sleep the time away?" Xavier told Zatch

"What! What's the Surprise?" Zatch asked excitedly

"If I told you that, it wouldn't be a surprise" Xavier explained

"Well shouldn't I take a bath first?" Zatch asked

_(I don't got time for this)_ Xavier sighed. "You can take one tomorrow, or go swimming in that river where you caught the fish" Xavier told Zatch

"Oh…ok" Zatch said in a defeated tone as he walked inside his room.

Before Xavier left to his room

"Can you put one of those orbs in here again?" Zatch asked while sitting on his bed.

Xavier nodded, and then did what Zatch asked of him, summoning one into Zatch's room to keep watch of him.

Xavier went to his own room and pulled out the suits of armor.

Xavier didn't pick the royal guard's armor, but chose the skeletal armor which had skulls dangling from the waste.

"Tonight…I shall show no mercy to those who stand in my way..." Xavier proclaimed as he attached the armor to his body.

Xavier didn't bother to summon any of his orbs to try and locate Zeno, since he already knew his exact location.

Xavier left his house to arrive at the Capital palace where the King and his son lived.

"It's been a month now since I've been here…Good thing I know this place like the back of my hand" Xavier said with an evil looking smile.

Xavier already knew the rotation of the shifts the Royal Guards went through, plus all of their positions.

"The king must be losing his edge, he hasn't changed much up since I've been gone" Xavier stated as he looked at the palace to see that it's being run the same way as before.

Xavier was standing next to a Well, which was almost filled to the brim with water.

Xavier let out a sigh…

"This is going to suck…" Xavier said, dreading that he didn't know a better way.

Xavier jumped into the Well and quickly swam/ sunk to the bottom, and started to walk/swim across its depths. The weight of his armor kept him firmly on the ground

At the bottom of the Well, was a large entrance way which was filled with water and it seemed as if it headed straight toward the castle.

The watery depths became pitch black, with only slight slivers of light created by the bending lights that somehow managed to reach near the bottom.

_(Shit…I forgot how long this craven was…I haven't been swimming in here since I was a child)_ Xavier thought as he swam only half way through the cavern.

In the current position Xavier was in now, he was just now under the mamodo Palace.

By now more light was now visible, but it didn't guarantee air, since those were just small openings for fountains, which were impossible to squeeze through the tiny holes.

_(This needs to be a quick in and out operation…anything else risks failure)_ Xavier thought to himself as he was nearly at the ending point of the underground water way.

All became black as Xavier now touched the end point of the underground aqueduct, Xavier started searching around the end of the walls, skimming his hands across the brick surface.

_(Found it!)_ Xavier thought in relief as he found a hidden push button which was some random brick in the wall.

The ceiling above him started to move slightly, and Xavier forced it open which lead to an opening with fresh clean air.

Xavier jumped out of the water and stood up to find himself in the Palace green house.

Xavier quietly placed the floor board back into place and started to make his way out of the green house, and remained undetected.

The Green house from Zeno's room was a supposed to be a 10 minute walk if you took the normal route.

Xavier knew all of the secret passage ways that not even most of the Royal Guard knew of.

Xavier Quickly entered a small Library nearby which was full of different kinds of books about plants.

"To bad there's not a passage way that directly goes to the young prince's room…" Xavier sighed then forced a bookshelf over 4 feet to reveal a hidden door behind it.

Xavier then heard a couple Royal Guards coming down the hall way, Xavier reacted quickly and entered the hidden door and put the bookshelf back into place right before he left.

The hidden passages were what you expected, Small, and cramped but large enough for Xavier to venture through. The walls were lined with brick and isolation, and a few wood struts here and there to keep the structure of the building. But there were small symbols carved onto each wood strut, it was obviously a spell to keep fire from spreading, and another devious symbol spell that made Xavier hesitate. The mamodo symbol was marked for death, which either meant it was a trap, or an attack spell that would hit an intruder directly. For the wood struts could use two symbols they had them separated and had a wood block placed between them.

"Now to get through this…" Xavier said to himself as he tried to formulate a plan to get through them. _(The Lord didn't have these here before…is it because he knew I would try something like this?)_ Xavier wondered while summoning around 50 of his clear small orbs.

"Now smash" Xavier laughed, Xavier extended his hand, and the 50 orbs went screaming down the passage way at an ridiculous speed, and they smashed into every single symbol that read "Death", which caused the symbol to either be unreadable or destroyed off the face of the wood beam.

Xavier kept on using the speed of his near undetectable orbs to keep on smashing every single thing that looked like a trap, to either disable it or try to quietly set it off.

Soon Xavier reached the stair way which lead to Zeno's room, to the third floor.

Xavier still behind the wall and nearing the end of the one way passage way found the a crease in the wall and pushed on it, it ended up being a revolving door.

Xavier then made a mad dash up the stairs with his 50 orbs floating around him, ready to act in a moment's notice.

Xavier reached the second floor then…

Xavier heard another couple of Royal Guards coming down the hall.

Instinctively Xavier used his orbs to lift him off his feet and make him hover on the ceiling of the floor.

The three guards passed right under Xavier without noticing him.

_(This is getting a bit difficult…I don't think I can keep on hiding my aura if I have to keep on using my powers)_ Xavier thought to himself as he gently landed back on the ground with the orbs still closely hugging his body.

Xavier got back into the stairway and made his way up to the 3rd floor, to Zeno's room.

Xavier finally reached the 3rd floor with no problems, and causally walked over to Zeno's door which was down the hallway, but since there was only 10 different rooms in the certain section of the building, there was no Royal Guards protecting Zeno's room.

Xavier kept walking down the hallway and stopped halfway, looking to his right, was his former room.

"Maybe I can just jump out of my window, when I get the Prince" Xavier laughed as he then ventured to Zeno's room.

Carefully opening the door, as quiet as he could and entering.

"Zeno, Zeno wake up" Xavier whispered as he reached Zeno's large bed.

Xavier started to shake a lump inside the bed, but found it strange that it didn't react.

"Zeno?" Xavier responded and pulled the blankets off to find that Zeno wasn't in his bed, and the lump was a pillow…

"What the hell?" Xavier said out load.

Xavier closed Zeno's door, for he could have a moment to himself.

_(Where the hell is he?)_ Xavier wondered as he sat down on Zeno's bed.

Xavier closely looked at the surroundings of Zeno's room.

The Room was relatively clean as always. But the bed itself looked like it had been collecting dust, suggesting that it hadn't been slept in for a while.

"Zeno is supposed to be asleep by 8 pm…9 at the most" Xavier told himself as he racked his brain trying to think of where Zeno would be.

It was very strange for Xavier, since Zeno had never broken curfew due to certain punishments.

Xavier looked at the clock to see that it was almost 10 PM.

"There's nothing to gain just standing around" Xavier told himself and exited Zeno's room, and started to walk down the hallway to his former room.

Out of curiosity, Xavier opened his former room to find it had been totally changed, and there was no one inside.

Further inspection revealed that the new owner was the new trainer of Zeno Bell!

"So this is who is training Zeno…" Xavier said as he looked around to see a variety of different weapons laced across the wall, all of them having different symbols that could cast spells, suggesting that the power used was not originally the owner's own.

With at least 100 different weapons scattered across the room, which all had spell symbols on them.

"Must be a weakling, relying on others" Xavier said in disgust. "So where is he now for I can kill him?" Xavier wondered as he looked around the room to see any clues.

On the wall, was a schedule which was partly blocked by the weapons themselves.

Monday/ 4 Am-12 at night Zeno's training- opponents 8- 1 hour to prepare

Tuesday/ 4Am- 12 at night Zeno's training-opponents 8- 1 hour to prepare

Wednesday/ 4Am-12 at night Zeno's training- opponents 8- 1 hour to prepare

Thursday/ 5Am-12 at night Zeno's training- opponents 8- 1 hour to prepare.

Friday/ 5 Am-12 at night Zeno's training- opponents 5- 2 hours prepare

Saturday/ 10 Am- to 8Pm Zeno's training- opponents 3-2 hours to prepare

Sunday/ 10 Am to 8PM Zeno's training- opponents 3- 2 hours to prepare

It went on like that for every week, which made Xavier furious.

"Who could follow this training regimen? Even I find it nearly impossible!" Xavier yelled angrily.

_(I have to find Zeno soon, before he dies from this type of training)_ Xavier thought to himself then headed out of the room with a good sense of direction.

Before Xavier left he left a couple of his floating orbs behind.

_(He's in the Training room…there's only one entrance…one exit…I guess I'm going to have to force my way through after all)_ Xavier sighed as he made the difficult journey down the flight of stairs, trying to remain undetected.

Xavier traveled to the basement, by the same set of stair ways and started to summon his weapons, which nearly revealed his mamodo Aura.

Putting his hands onto the ground, Xavier started to pull out two scythes out of the ground which appeared to be coming out of some sort of portal.

The Scythe in his right hand, had a blacken blade and was slightly curved, the blade was sharp and thin, but had a sturdy feel to it, so it would break. The handle and the pole itself seemed to wrap around Xavier's right arm, as if it was almost connected, the handle also looked like it was made out of muscles without the skin to cover it. At the end of the handle, was a small mamodo skull that had the back of its head removed so it could fit perfectly to the handle.

The Scythe in his left hand was pitch white, the handle and the blade both, the handle had different hand grips going throughout the handle, most likely used to change styles of technique. The blade nearly looked like a fishing hook because it's blade was curved in such a way that it looked like it could catch anything. The blade even had small slits and indents that were made for gripping and ripping into flesh.

"I wonder how Zeno will react once he sees this form…I've never shown it to him before" Xavier said then smiled to himself. (He'd better be here, or I'll spank him the next time I see him! I didn't come all this way for nothing.) Xavier told himself then started to run down the hallway which was lit with the occasional candle that was hooked onto the wall.

There was only two Royal Guards which guarded the entrance into Zeno's private training room.

"Wait who's that!" The guard shouted out

Both Guards took a stance and pulled out two large spears.

"Out of my way!" Xavier shouted

Xavier made the first move with his white Scythe, but within a near second used his black scythe. The two combo was used on the first guard, the movements were so quick that neither of them could tell if Xavier had casted a spell.

Soon after the First Guard dropped to the floor and past out, but was having a hard time breathing.

"Impossible!" The guard shouted then summoned a large iron Shield that blocked off the hallway, giving him distance between Xavier.

With the same motions that almost seemed to be instantaneous, Xavier simply grazed the shield, which cancelled it out.

The Guard was shocked at what just happened but countered instantly with a Gigano class spell. The spell was a large powerful beam that came out of the tip of his spear.

Xavier didn't try to block, but instead leaped into the corner of the ceiling, barely dodging the attack.

The spell created a large explosion, outside of the training room, which alarmed those inside the training room

Xavier then pounced on his opponent and swiped at him with both blades; the Royal Guard soon dropped to the floor unconscious, and was also having hard time breathing.

One slash mark went through the chest plate of the Royal Guard, but it didn't look like it was enough to kill a mamodo.

"Hopefully I can end this quickly" Xavier told himself as he entered the Training room.

It was a large square room, which surprising had very little damage done to it. The room had the ability to self-mend itself, within a matter of hours.

Xavier looked around and quickly spotted Zeno lying on the ground, almost beaten beyond recognition.

And a large man standing beside him must've been Zeno's new trainer. The man had gold encrusted armor, and even jewels imbedded into the chest plate. The armor in general looked like it cost a fortune even by the king's standards. There were a few symbols for spell use carved into the shin guards of his legs. He had the face of a prep boy, and had purple hair.

"Who the hell are you?" Zeno's new trainer shouted at Xavier

Zeno didn't move to see who the intruder was.

"What did you do to the boy?" Xavier asked the trainer

"Why does it matter to…?" The Trainer then recognized that he was talking to Zeno's former trainer…

"I do put Zeno through harsh training, but it's the type where he actually learns how to fight! Zeno is barely alive you DUMBASS!" Xavier shouted then casted a spell which started to form around his black Scythe

At the skull on the end of the scythe formed a ghost like figure which was a face of a ghastly mamodo.

"Who cares if Zeno dies?!" The trainer laughed at Xavier

"What?!" Xavier shouted back

"I'll simply have him brought back to life" The Trainer stated with an evil grin. "He's a lively one though." The Trainer said while taking out two medium sized swords out of the sheaths, both of them had a mamodo symbol on it.

Xavier's blood started to boil, "I'll show you how it feels to DIE!" Xavier shouted as he charged at the Trainer

"The king told me about your abilities, I take it that's your Reaper Form…what a stupid name" The Trainer laughed at Xavier.

Xavier didn't care as he leaped above the Trainer's head and came down swinging his left blade at his arm.

Instinctively the Trainer dodged the attack and ran behind the motionless Zeno.

"Hiding behind children, you truly are a coward" Xavier growled as he still charged his opponent.

Xavier changed the place where he held the left scythe and grabbed it near the end of the handle.

"Use whatever you can!" The Trainer shouted as he kicked Zeno at Xavier.

Xavier's instinct was to simply dodge Zeno and let him fall, but he didn't.

Xavier slammed his left scythe blade into the ground and caught Zeno with one hand.

Xavier quickly tried, but gently put Zeno onto the ground but was forced against it because the Trainer had launched a Gigano class spell at him.

The Gigano class spell was a large slash of vertical energy that went streaming across the battlefield toward Xavier.

Xavier had no choice but to abandon his left scythe and dodge the attack with Zeno still being carried in his left hand.

"Damn COWARD!" Xavier shouted at the man.

"The king told me to do whatever possible to keep Zeno out of your hands…and I won't disobey his orders" The Trainer stated with evil intentions.

Xavier looked at his weapon which had been barely hurt by the Gigano class spell.

"Surely you have more power than that!" The Trainer laughed at Xavier.

"I'll rip your heart out!" Xavier shouted then charged the Trainer with only his right scythe

"Ha! That combination won't work against me! You're only at half strength now!" The Trainer laughed as he unleashed a Dioga class spell.

The spell was strangely different from the one that he had previously casted, it was a large fire serpent that came rushing out of the blade.

_(Shit!)_ Xavier thought as he turned his back to it and held Zeno close to his body in order to protect him.

Xavier ended up taking the spell head on.

The fire Serpent created a large explosion that set the surrounding area ablaze.

"AAHHHH" Xavier screamed in pain as the fire started to melt through his armor.

"Ha! Useless without the second blade, are you?" The Trainer laughed as he already knew Xavier's weakness.

Zeno finally started to wake up.

"Uhh…" Zeno mumbled as he looked around, he thought he was still in battle.

"Z…Zeno, you finally got your lazy ass up" Xavier joked as he felt a pain in his back.

"Teacher!" Zeno yelled

"I'm not your teacher anymore…but I would like it if you stayed out of my way…Zeno" Xavier stated then put Zeno down on the ground.

Zeno tried moving around on his legs, to help his former teacher but found it difficult to even stand up.

"Damn…I'm sorry" Zeno cursed himself, as he sat down on the ground.

Zeno's legs were all bruised, and Xavier couldn't tell if they were broken or not just by looking at them.

"The runt woke up? I thought he was dead" The Trainer laughed

"Up Yours!" Zeno retorted

"I'll make you regret talking back to me…Zeno" The Trainer yelled at the injured boy.

Xavier turned around, and then looked at his surroundings.

"I'm not totally useless without my other blade…" Xavier stated then touched the ground with his right Scythe.

The skull on the tip of the handle looked acted almost like it was spitting up some sort of acid as it started to erode away the floor underneath Xavier which created a large trench.

Zeno was instructed to hide inside the trench.

"Stay here, Zeno, and I'll bring you back a souvenir" Xavier stated as he made a mad dash over to his left handed scythe which was still lodged into the ground.

"I won't let you!" The Trainer shouted then charged at Xavier

"ZAKERGA!" Zeno shouted with anger.

The large condense blast of lightning made its mark and forced the Trainer 30 feet back in the opposite direction.

Zeno still looked exhausted, and was barely able to keep his eyes open, but he smiled as he knew he had made contact and made him feel pain.

"Bastard! Which side are you on?" the Trainer shouted at Zeno.

"The one that doesn't try to kill me every day!" Zeno retorted

The Trainer looked back at Xavier to try and stop him but it was too late.

Xavier had both blades and was rearing to go.

"That won't help you!" The Trainer shouted as he summoned the large fire serpent.

"I might not specialize in Ultimate's…but then again, those were never my Forte!" Xavier shouted as he stood a firm ground against the attack.

Right before the spell impacted Xavier, Xavier cut the face of the spell with the left blade. In everyone's surprise it looked like Xavier had created two of the spells, but the second one was see-through and looked like a ghost of its other self. As the Scythe was being dragged across It's body. Xavier then cut the second Fire form of the serpent with his right scythe, the skull ghost near the tip of the blade started to eat up the fire serpent quickly, first the head was eaten up, which caused the original head of the fire serpent spell to disappear. Then the Ghost on the tip of the spear quickly ate up the rest of the body like a vacuum cleaner, soon the original fire serpent disappeared as well.

"Wh…What the? I knew it could do that, but so quickly?" The Trainer was impressed.

The Dioga Fire Serpent spell was destroyed within a matter of seconds.

Xavier landed on the ground and stared down his opponent.

Slight bits of fire was still being sucked into the ghost of the black blade. But everyone soon noticed that the ghost had grown 2 it's normal size.

"What's this? The king didn't tell me about that" The Trainer said confused.

"It's probably because I showed it to him, only once…" Xavier responded. "Whatever you summon, I will eat it whole!" Xavier shouted while pointing the black blade at the Trainer.

In a mocking like fashion, the ghost of the black blade stuck out 3 foot long tongue at the Trainer.

"Don't get full of yourself! There's always a limit to every spell! And I'm betting that when that ghost becomes too large, it'll stop working!" The Trainer explained and felt full of himself.

"I don't really care what you think, I'll make this thing sallow you then spit you back out like the trash you are!" Xavier shouted then rushed at The Trainer.

"Try it!" The Trainer shouted back and summoned 6 more swords out of nowhere.

_(Those weapons came from his room…checkmate)_ Xavier thought and smiled

"Each one of these has a different spell! Will you be able to stop them all?!" The Trainer shouted at Xavier

"Those powers aren't even yours. You bought them in the black market to those who desperately needed the money…disgraceful!" Xavier said in a detested tone.

"Money is power. Didn't anyone ever teach you that?" The Trainer retorted

_(This idiot has no morals)_ Xavier thought. He then started to cut at the floor with his white scythe

_(What's he planning?)_ The Trainer thought to himself as he observed his opponent carefully

"HEY! Stop messing around and bring me his head!" Zeno demanded of Xavier

Xavier laughed a little as he swiped his white scythe upwards which created a near duplicate of the ground that it had just swiped.

Xavier then slashed the ghost like duplicate with the black scythe causing the ghost mamodo in the end to start eating up the floor.

Within an instant 10 feet of concrete floor was enveloped and swallowed.

The ghost grew slightly larger and burped out a green gas.

_(What was the point in doing that?)_ The Trainer and Zeno both thought.

Xavier started to dash at The Trainer at Max speed.

In response the Trainer unleashed 7 Gigano spells, plus one Dioga spell which was the fire serpent.

Each spell came rushing out of the sword which was powered by The Trainer.

One was a giant ball of fire that had a lava core

Another one was a large diamond that was shaped like a bullet

One even looked like Zeno's Lightning yo-yo, part of its energy was most likely taken from Zeno by force.

"Hey! That's mine!" Zeno shouted. (I thought that spell was slightly weaker when I used it…) Zeno thought when thinking back when he used the Ultimate spell which unleashed The lightning yo-yo.

More spells kept on coming.

A large slash of energy came screaming toward Xavier

The Trainer started to sweat as he was unleashing to many spells at once.

A spear touched the ground and summoned a large wave of water that had ice crystals inside it.

One of the swords enlarged to be 20 times its normal size and came down swinging at Xavier.

"No one can stop that many spells and hope to live!" The Trainer laughed as he nearly fell to one knee because he had used up a lot of energy.

Xavier quickly pointed his black blade in front to force the ghost to vomit up the previous stone floor that he had eaten up.

Xavier used it as a boost to jump above the large wave of freezing water.

_(That's one…now how to deal with the other?)_ Xavier thought as he looked at the oncoming onslaught.

The large blade hovering over Xavier came crashing down.

Xavier quickly swung his white blade and ripped out it's energy creating a near duplicate, Xavier then slashed at the duplicate causing the Large Sword to be swallowed whole by the ghost.

_(Wait, if he can spit out the floor…can he spit back out the spell too?)_ Zeno wondered as he looked at his former Teacher hoping that he would bring his new Teacher's head to him on a silver platter.

The giant fire ball and the large Diamond was about to smash into Xavier, until he activated a body enhancement spell that increased his speed.

Xavier within a split second slashed at both spells with both of the scythes, causing the ghost to gobble up its energy making the spells cancel out.

Xavier then landed on the ground to have to deal with The fire Serpent which was a Dioga class level, and Zeno's lightning yo-yo which was at Gigano class level.

"I'll show you its true power!" Zeno shouted as he raised his hand and summoned out a large lightning yo-yo which was considerably bigger than The Trainer's.

"Damn it Zeno! Stop interfering!" The Trainer yelled at Zeno to only witness that his spell had been completely destroyed by Zeno's spell.

Zeno felt a slight bit of power reenter his body, as he retook back what was rightfully his.

Xavier used the chance to once again cancel out the Large fire Serpent, with the two swings of his blades.

Xavier then simply dodged the last Gigano spell which was the large slash of energy.

Xavier's ghost that was on the end of the handle grew to an enormous size and looked like it was about ready to burst. The ghost's entire body had become visible, and it looked like a goblin with an enormous belly.

"Damn it!" The Trainer shouted out.

"What's wrong? You have more weapons then that right?" Xavier taunted The Trainer. "I wonder…if you could survive if I unleashed all of the spells that I just gathered up?" Xavier stated with an evil smile

The Trainer stood back up right and began to build up energy.

The Trainer was obviously freighted by that remark.

"I won't let you!" The Trainer responded ."I'll show you the true extent to my power!" The Trainer shouted as new portals started to open up, The Trainer started to have a hard time summoning them all at once.

_(Now, Multiply!)_ Xavier ordered his orb, which had been left inside of the Trainer's room.

The orb in The Trainer's room doubled, then tripled, and kept on doing so until there were 100 of them inside the room.

_(Attach)_ Xavier ordered

The orbs quickly became a liquid like substance and each one individually attached themselves to a different weapon, right on the symbol for a spell.

"I'll kill you, I'll unleash 100 spells if I have to!" The Trainer shouted as he summoned 100 different kinds of weapons that ranged from maces, swords, spears, bows and arrows, even a couple katana.

"Now try to eat this!" The trainer laughed.

The Trainer began pouring all of his energy into his weapons.

The Trainer soon feel to the ground exhausted, being certain of victory.

Most of the weapons had a see-through attached to it, and they had begun glowing with the Trainer's energy running through them.

"You know…you could've won this fight if you hadn't gone all out, this weapon is at it's limit, and it can't spit back out spells…that's only real matter" Xavier said in a calm demeanor

"What is this? A last words?" The Trainer laughed as he didn't notice he had been set inside a trap.

The weapons were floating closely to the Trainer, in order to protect him, and make it easier for him to control the power of the spells.

"I wouldn't have been able to win, if I never found your room" Xavier said with a cold tone.

"What?" The trainer responded and tried looking above him. In his horror, he seen Xavier's orbs attached to his weapons which were draining the energy out of the weapons.

"If you had Zeno follow my regimen I would have never went inside that room to find out any clues…Karma…it's a bitch" Xavier said with an evil smile

"Explode!" Xavier ordered all of his orbs to explode

With the energy stored up inside the Orbs became deadly and powerful Energy bombs, or high explosive grenades

"Shit, shit NO!" The Trainer shouted and tried to stand to his feet but feel down because of the lack of energy in his body.

The orbs exploded with a high intensity of energy being released at a sudden moment.

The entire room shake as the blast made a huge crater inside the floor where it was hovering near.

The Trainer's screams of pain was muffled out by the noise of the blast itself.

Xavier had a hard time even withstanding the heat of it.

Zeno had ducked and covered inside the trench so he was unharmed.

The entire castle heard the explosion

…

…

Xavier stood back up on his feet and dusted himself off.

"Damn, those orbs are expensive….that's 30 years' worth of pay down the toilet.

As the smoke cleared, it still showed the Trainer still had his body intact somehow.

Xavier presumed that he used a body enhancement spell right at the last second.

As the smoke completely cleared, the Trainer had scorch marks across his body, and his armor had been completely destroyed and ripped off. The shrapnel created by the destruction of his weapons were laced throughout his skin, he even had part of a sword jutting out of his stomach.

"You're still alive?" Xavier and Zeno both responded quite impressed.

The Trainer couldn't respond, since his windpipe looked like it had been crushed.

Xavier walked over to the man who was still simmering.

"You said, who cares if Zeno dies? Didn't you?" Xavier told the man

The Trainer was still on the floor writhing in pain, and couldn't pay attention to anything else.

"I want to show you…how it feels like to die, then come back to life" Xavier said with the coldest type of tone.

Xavier touched the Trainer with the White scythe and ripped out his soul like energy, then cut it in pieces with the black blade.

The ghost devoured The Trainer's soul.

The Trainer's soul became a lifeless corpse.

"Now giggle him around a little bit, in the pool of energy" Xavier instructed the ghost on his scythe

In response the ghost did some sort of weird dance on the end of the handle, having his fat belly jump up and down.

"Now spit him out" Xavier demanded

The Ghost pouted a little but gave into Xavier's demand and spat out The Trainer's soul which almost instantly went back into it's original body.

"Well? How does it feel? To die, then come back to life?" Xavier asked the Trainer

"Please…no…no more…I've lost…please…spar me" The Trainer begged.

Xavier started laughing

"Spar you!" Xavier laughed

"I…can't do any….more harm" The Trainer responded while still lying on the floor with blood pooling out of his body.

"Your head will make a great trophy on my armor" Xavier said with a devious smile as he once again ripped the Trainer's soul out with the white blade, then cut it with the black blade.

The Ghost happily ate his meal.

"Stay there for 600 years, then I'll consider letting you go" Xavier laughed as he released his spell, which caused the ghost to disappear from the end of the handle.

"Teacher…" Zeno called out.

Xavier looked at Zeno, who was still pretty badly injured.

Xavier cut off The Trainer's head and tied it to his waist.

"What's wrong with this world now and days? That man never used a single spell that actually was his originally" Xavier said disappointed as he walked over to Zeno.

"Why did you come?" Zeno asked

"Why you ask?" Xavier responded and thought about it. "I might have been fired…but I made an oath to make you the strongest mamodo, a mamodo who would become king. And I don't break promises" Xavier explained

"And it's that simple?" Zeno stated while being slightly confused

"Yep, can you walk?" Xavier asked

"No…" Zeno said in an embarrassed like fashion.

"The entire castle knows there's an intruder now, so hang on tight, and don't let go" Xavier told Zeno as he picked Zeno up and put him on his shoulders.

"HOLT!" A Royal Guard shouted

5 more Royal Guards came following behind.

"So you've come to break me out of this hell hole?" Zeno asked

"That's the plan!" Xavier shouted while charging the 5 royal guards.

The Royal guard tried stabbing Xavier with their spears, but all of them missed simultaneously.

Xavier then reacted by spinning on his heel and swinging his two blades at all of the 5 royal guards, which made direct contact and drained them of most of their energy.

"What happened to the ghost thingy?" Zeno asked

As the 5 royal guards dropped to the floor…

"He's full, and now he's sleeping, I won't be able to use him until tomorrow" Xavier explained

"That's convenient" Zeno responded sarcastically

Xavier then made a mad dash out of the training room and out of the basement before any more royal guards came.

But instead of going through the secret passage ways, he ran upstairs to the third floor where his former room was.

"Get him!" One royal guard shouted.

Xavier could hear about 10 Royal Guards running up the stairs after him.

"Zaker" Zeno yelled

Zeno created a small electric blast that ruined the stairway making it hard for the Royal Guards to follow them up.

"Is that all you got?" Xavier asked

"Be quiet…I have barely anything left…" Zeno said in a sleepy like fashion.

"HEY! Don't fall asleep!" Xavier yelled at Zeno.

"Stop giving me orders, you're not my teacher anymore" Zeno retorted, but he slapped himself in the face in order to keep himself awake.

"Damn, this is not how I wanted to kidnap you!" Xavier shouted as he broke down the door leading to his former room.

"Kidnap me? I thought you were rescuing me?" Zeno responded

"Tomato, Tamato" Xavier responded as he threw Zeno onto the bed then started smashing up the walls in the room.

"This isn't time to be decorating!" Zeno yelled at Xavier

"Shut up!" Xavier yelled back, he could hear footsteps coming closer and closer. "Here it is!" Xavier shouted as he tore down part of his wall to reveal a large symbol, which read "Transportation".

"What the? When did you put that there?" Zeno asked

"A while ago" Xavier responded, Xavier then grabbed Zeno's hand and touched the symbol and poured his energy into it.

Right before Xavier left, he left an orb behind.

Xavier then teleported with Zeno, and ended somewhere outside of the mamodo capital. With another transportation symbol right underneath them, Xavier didn't want the Royal Guard following them.

"Explode" Xavier commanded the remaining orb inside the room which was inside the castle.

The orb created a medium size explosion, which destroyed the symbol for the royal guard couldn't use it to track them.

"Finally!" Zeno said happily as he lay down on the grass.

"Don't go to sleep yet Zeno, we still got to go home" Xavier responded then looked over to Zeno to see that he was asleep already.

_(Well…it's past his curfew…)_ Xavier thought, as he started to relax on the grass besides Zeno.

"Tomorrow should be interesting" Xavier told himself as he wondered how Zeno would react to have to live with his younger brother.

…


	12. Chapter 12

Chapter 12 "Big Brother"

Authors Note: Last Chapter I will admit, I messed up the ending…because it was late at night, and I was tired. I was planning on having Xavier escape like some sort of burglar and leap out of a window, to only kill a couple more guards, then run off while holding Zeno…But I was TIRED. So I half-assed it and went to sleep. I'm sorry, but it happens sometimes. Read and Enjoy. R&E

If anyone's confused to how Xavier and Zeno escaped, they used a teleportation symbol. I didn't explain what it looked like, but in "The Race" Chapter School, I've clearly explained what the symbol looks like.

…

Zeno had finally woken up, way past the time when the sun had risen, but found that he had been moved from his previous spot.

"Uhh…where am I?" Zeno asked as he looked around to find himself under a tree.

Xavier came walking from behind the tree where Zeno had been sleeping.

"We had to get moving, and you didn't want to wake up" Xavier responded

Xavier and Zeno were now 40 miles away from the mamodo capital, and only 10 miles away from Xavier's new house.

"So…you carried me again?" Zeno asked as he tried to pick himself up, once he was standing upright he started to feel slightly dizzy.

"That's right, can you walk?" Xavier responded

"Shut your face, this is nothing!" Zeno retorted.

"Well Should we get going?" Xavier responded while now walking toward the direction of his house.

"Wait!" Zeno yelled out.

Xavier turned around.

"Is this alright? I'm don't like running away" Zeno tried to explain, while having a unsure look on his face.

"Worried that Daddy will be mad at you?" Xavier laughed

"I never said that!" Zeno exclaimed

"Then don't call it running away…You're moving out" Xavier responded. "Since who's the best trainer in the mamodo world?" Xavier stated while pointing to himself.

Zeno started to look around, "I don't know, would you like to show me this trainer?" Zeno responded with sarcasm.

That statement slightly annoyed Xavier, "Just keep it up Zeno" Xavier warned.

Xavier then begun walking again with Zeno following him in toe.

While they were only a few minutes from being able to see the house, through an opening through the forest.

_(He's going to find out sooner or later…and it's really soon till then)_ Xavier thought while he wondered how he was going to tell Zeno about Zatch.

"Zeno…" Xavier said while looking down at the silver haired child.

"What?" Zeno responded

"Well…when we get to the house…I have a big surprise to show you" Xavier told Zeno.

_(I wonder if I chose the right words.)_ Xavier wondered

"Surprise? I don't like surprises." Zeno retorted with an annoyed tone.

_(Then I bet he's going to hate this one)_ Xavier sighed.

"So what is it?" Zeno demanded

"Well…it's what you always wanted!" Xavier proclaimed, but sort of lied.

"And what would that be?" Zeno said with a smile.

"You'll find out once we get there" Xavier responded

"I hate waiting" Zeno pouted, Zeno then started to pick up his pace and walked ahead of Xavier.

_(Oh well, this will all be worth it if I can just see the look on his face)_ Xavier started to laugh a little.

Zeno didn't notice, since he was now 50 feet ahead of Xavier.

Zeno finally was able to see the house, where Xavier was living at.

"What a dump" Zeno remarked

"What you talking about? It's a nice little 'get away'" Xavier responded

All of a sudden a loud voice yelled throughout the house, which kept on say "Xavier! Xavier!" the voice yelled out.

Zeno instantly recognized the voice.

Zeno snapped his head toward Xavier

"You didn't!" Zeno yelled at Xavier

"Just think on the bright side Zeno…" Xavier responded but was cut off.

"Bright side? I don't even like Zatch, plus I bet he thinks of me as a monster!" Zeno yelled at Xavier

"That's not true, he's been saying where's my "Big Brother Zeno" ever since he's been with me" Xavier responded

Zeno thought about the title "Big Brother"

"Hell no!" Zeno exclaimed while crossing his arms in an X formation.

"At least try!" Xavier stated

Then Zatch came running out of the house to spot both Xavier and Zeno standing beside him.

"ZENO!" Zatch screamed excitedly, Zatch begun running at Zeno full speed with his arms open.

"?" Zeno looked at Zatch slightly confused, and thought it was an attack.

Right before Zatch tried to give Zeno a hug, Zeno reacted by kicking Zatch in the leg which caused him to spiral to the ground.

"Ouchy, Ouchy, ouch!" Zatch cried out while holding his shin.

"He was trying to hug you Zeno" Xavier tried to explain.

"Really? Good thing I kicked him then" Zeno responded with a smile while ripping off Xavier's trophy head he got while in the castle.

"Zeno!" Xavier responded trying to grab it back.

Zatch lifted his head to look at Zeno.

In response Zeno put the decapitated head right in front of Zatch's face.

Zatch in looked at the lifeless face which still had it's eyes open, but they were nearly rolled into the back of the skull. The blood that dripped out of the head had dried.

Zatch's face went blank with fear, and he jumped back 10 feet and screamed in fear.

Zeno started to laugh, "That's what…you get for trying to…touch me" Zeno said between laughs.

Xavier snatched the head from Zeno and put it into a pouch for Zatch couldn't see it anymore.

"I'm sorry!" Zatch cried out

"Enough!" Xavier yelled out

Zatch got even more scared as if he were in trouble.

Zeno just smiled.

"Zatch, go back inside please" Xavier requested.

"Ok Xavier" Zatch responded and with that Zatch walked back into the house.

Both Xavier and Zeno faced each other.

"What's the meaning of this?" Xavier and Zeno yelled at each other in unison.

"Shut up and listen for a minute!" Xavier responded

"I should've stayed inside the castle, I would've killed that bastard sooner or later!" Zeno yelled at Xavier

Xavier hit Zeno on the top of the head with the pouch that contained the decapitated head.

Zeno head his head and glared at Xavier, "Did you just hit me with that?" Zeno growled.

"Now listen! This is all for you" Xavier told Zeno.

"Oh? What making me babysit my brother?" Zeno retorted.

"No, in order for you to become stronger" Xavier responded

Zeno became interested.

"How so?" Zeno asked

Xavier looked toward the house, "Right now Zatch is weak, and he's happy without using his powers" Xavier tried explaining to Zeno.

"So you keep him happy?" Zeno responded

"For what he has to offer, yes. It's the least I can do" Xavier told Zeno.

"Well I STILL waiting to hear how I become stronger" Zeno responded while crossing his arms.

"I will train the both of you, to make Zatch stronger will also make you stronger" Xavier told Zeno.

"?" Zeno became confused again.

"When Zatch can control his power, he will be able to transfer all of his power to you" Xavier stated coldly.

Zeno's face went blank

"So…we're using him?" Zeno said in surprise.

"Yes, you will be given Baou, and maybe even the other 50 percent of your Father's powers" Xavier told Zeno.

Zeno was still shocked that his instructor came up with this sort of plan.

"To be able to control Baou, Zatch must become stronger. And when that time comes, I hope that you can persuade Zatch to give you his powers" Xavier told Zeno

Zeno tried thinking of the entire situation.

"And how exactly will he "willingly" Give me Baou?" Zeno asked

"Well that stunt that you just pulled on Zatch, I will ask that you refrain from doing it again" Xavier stated.

"So…you want me to create a bond with Zatch? Just for I can use him later on?" Zeno exclaimed.

"Yes" Xavier responded

"What will become of him afterwards?" Zeno asked

"I'll still take care of him, if you wish" Xavier stated.

"It is…" Zeno said while turning away from Xavier and faced the house. "Teacher…I really like this plan, it's the first good news I've heard In a long time" Zeno said with a smile.

"My name is Xavier" Xavier introduced his name to Zeno.

"Yeah…Zatch called you that, but…I don't like it, so I'll refrain from using it." Zeno responded then started to walk towards the house.

Xavier sighed, _(Well at least he agreed with me. This plan won't fail, no matter how long it takes…Zeno will become King)_ Xavier thought with a devious thinking.

Xavier started to walk into the house as well.

"Hey Zatch! Show me your room!" Zeno yelled while running into the house, trying to put on a friendly face.

While inside the house

"Unu, Really?" Zatch asked

"Well yeah, sure…" Zeno said trying to think of how he could pull off being "Friendly" with his younger brother.

"Unu, come on! I painted it myself" Zatch said excitedly.

Zatch then grabbed Zeno's hand, and Zeno glared at Zatch again.

In response Zatch quickly let go of Zeno and backed away.

_(Damn it)_ Zeno cursed himself.

"Sorry Zeno" Zatch apologized, Zatch looked tense.

Zeno put on a fake smile, "No, it's fine" Zeno told Zatch which put Zatch into a relaxed but excited posture. Zeno slowly extended his hand, "Pl….Plea…Please show me your room" Zeno requested but he had a hard time pronouncing "Please".

"Unu!" Zatch responded and grabbed Zeno's hand and brought him over to his room.

Zeno and Zatch entered into Zatch's room.

The room was painted Orange and red, with a peculiar part of the wall that was a drawing. The drawing was a decent paint job of the Sun, with Red being the red circle and orange going around it. Zatch then tried to paint a horizon of what a sunset looked like, but didn't do a great job at it. The other three walls some blue and white patches on it, which depicted the sky and clouds.

_(He likes the outside so much he painted his room of the outside…)_ Zeno thought while looking around.

There were two dressers at the front part of the room, and a twin size bed near the window which was on the left side of the room. The last thing that stood out was a shelf with only about 10 kid books laid neatly inside. The room was a decent size, which still had room enough to neatly fit 2 more dressers.

"So what do you think?" Zatch asked with a smile. Zatch was obviously proud of his work, since he did most of it, except for the heavy lifting.

Zeno looked at his brother. "I've seen better." Zeno responded, he was still slightly standing outside of Zatch's room.

"Oh…" Zatch said, he was disappointed with Zeno's answer.

"So where's my room?" Zeno asked.

"Oh…well that would be the third room…right?" Zatch responded while once again grabbing Zeno's hand and showing him to the room which was right across from Zatch's room, Xavier's room was down the hall.

Zatch opened the door, to show Zeno his room.

The room had no paint and was bare, there was a twin size bed, and 1 dresser but it had two shelves.

"This sucks" Zeno responded looking at his room.

"Well…it's not finished." Zatch tried to explain.

"This house sucks" Zeno stated while looking around.

"Still making fun of my house?" Xavier responded while walking up to the twins.

"Yeah, cause my room sucks!" Zeno yelled at Xavier

"We only been here for a day now Zeno" Zatch tried to explain.

"Excuses, excuses." Zeno responded simply.

"Well then until we finish your room, I guess you can sleep with Zatch tonight" Xavier told Zeno with a smile that basically screamed "Payback!"

Zeno was about to yell at Xavier until…

"Yea! Zeno we can have a sleepover!" Zatch yelled excitedly

"We live together, it's not a sleepover, fool" Zeno told Zatch

Zatch didn't care, for he started to set up games inside his room.

Zeno glared at Xavier, "You're enjoying this aren't you?" Zeno growled with a death like stare.

"Well of course, I have to have fun to ya know" Xavier laughed as he walked into the kitchen to begin lunch.

"Zeno, you want to play this game?" Zatch asked happily while holding out a board game that was in the box.

"I rather not" Zeno responded in a monotone voice

_(Stupid mamodo physics)_ Zeno grumbled as Zatch brought Zeno into his room to play.

As Zatch sat on the ground and pulled the game out and gave Zeno a board piece.

_(I must be dreaming…one day I'm training, and now I'm playing a game with my stupid brother…)_ Zeno thought then pinched himself to see if he was dreaming. "Damn almost wish it was" Zeno whispered to himself.

"Wish for what?" Zatch responded

"Be quiet and lets play the game" Zeno retorted, Zeno actually started to play with Zatch, not like he had much of a choice.

30 minutes later and Zeno had nearly lost his sanity.

"I can't take it anymore!" Zeno complained while throwing the board game into the air.

Zatch and Zeno had played through 2 kid board games and Zatch had won both.

It was only a game, but Zeno found out that he hated losing, especially to the person that he was supposed to be able to beat at anything, his younger brother.

"Nuu, But you almost won last time" Zatch responded while setting up a different game that looked like the "Candy Land" game.

"It's a game based on luck…and my luck is terrible" Zeno responded while lying on the ground with his arms crisscrossing his chest. He effectively gave up.

"Then what about this one?" Zatch asked while showing a different game to Zeno but it had the same rules.

"No, something else…anything else" Zeno responded

"But Xavier bought these" Zatch tried to explain.

"Stop calling him that, call him 'teacher'" Zeno ordered

Zatch thought about it for a moment, "But…he's not a teacher" Zatch responded

(This is too weird…this entire thing is wrong, Wrong!) Zeno thought, until his thought process was broken by Xavier walking in with two Yellowtail sandwiches.

"Here's your lunch, tomorrow we'll see if you're well enough to start training Zeno, and Zatch, you're going too." Xavier told the two kids and handed them their lunch.

"Training?" Zatch asked slightly confused

"It's to make it so you're not a weakling" Zeno told his brother.

"…is it…going to hurt?" Zatch asked a little worried.

"Yes" Zeno responded

"No" Xavier quickly responded

Both of them answered at relatively the same time.

"It's only the first day, so I'll be training you the basics Zatch" Xavier told Zatch

_(At least I know I can beat him at this)_ Zeno thought and smiled as he was about to gain a victory over Zatch.

Currently in Zeno's mind it was 2-0, 2 for Zatch and 0 for Zeno.

Zatch of course didn't care what the score was, he was just happy to spend time with his brother.

…

The day went on, being mostly awkward for Zeno, but Zatch made the most of it, spending as much time as he could with his older brother.

To Zeno's dismay, Xavier had them take baths together. Of course Zatch didn't mind.

…

Later that night, it was 8 PM, Zeno's curfew.

It was night time, and Xavier had headed off to bed, but not before he had the twins go inside the same room to go to sleep.

Zeno was in his pajamas and was ready for bed, but he didn't want to sleep with Zatch.

"I don't want to sleep with him!" Zeno complained

The entire day seemed miserable to Zeno, since eating dinner at the table with Zatch and Xavier seemed almost too normal. But it wasn't for Zeno since he was supposed to be using his brother to gain Baou. The entire thought process of it was messing with Zeno's head. Be kind, but keep distant is what Zeno kept telling himself.

"You two should form a bond, to make it easier" Xavier told Zeno.

The two of them were outside of Zatch's room.

Zatch had already gone to bed and was asleep. The door to Zatch's room was closed.

"That doesn't make sense! I don't form bonds with people I don't like" Zeno tried to explain.

"Keep quiet, you can obviously see that Zatch loves, or at least likes you for some reason. Even though you try to alienate yourself from him, this won't help you in the long run Zeno." Xavier responded in a serious tone.

Zeno let out a sigh.

"Screw it. So I have to form a bond with him, and later break it…" Zeno stated

"It just depends on how you handle the situation when the time comes" Xavier told Zeno, and then he started to guide Zeno into Zatch's room.

_(I'm always going to have to keep an eye on him…and he's telling me that I should try and love him…it doesn't make sense)_ Zeno thought as he was pushed into Zatch's room.

The door was closed behind Zeno. And the footsteps of Xavier could be heard going down the hallway into his room.

Zeno let out another loud sigh.

Zeno lay down on Zatch's bed, and stared at him sleeping for a couple moments.

_(Love this fool...as if)_ Zeno thought to himself as he laughed a little, and then pushed Zatch off his own bed.

Zatch landed on the ground with a thump, with one of the blankets that he carried with him softened his fall.

Zeno still had a blanket of his own so he didn't care much. What surprised him is that Zatch didn't wake up from the fall, he just lay their as if nothing happened.

Zeno laughed again, with a small smile of victory of him having the bed to himself, he went to sleep.


	13. Chapter 13

Chapter 13 the Good Life?

Authors Note: which stories do you the readers like more? "Never Separated" or "Alternate Events: Zatch and Zeno". I think Alternate Events is well…it has less grammatical errors, plus it's a lot more detailed. Sooner or later I have to edit "Never Separated". Enjoy the chapter.

…

It felt slightly cold as Zatch woke up after sleeping on the floor.

The time was around 8Am, much later than the usual time he woke up.

Zatch gave out a yawn and looked around for Zeno to see that he wasn't inside of the room.

"…I overslept…" Zatch said in a groggy like tone. "…Zeno?" Zatch called out while stumbling back onto his feet and walking out of the room.

"Zatch, you're awake. Get over here." A voice called out Zatch, and the location was from the kitchen.

Zatch knew the voice belonged to Xavier, and decided to follow it.

Zatch walked into the kitchen to see food already set on the round wooden table.

And surprisingly Zeno was up before Zatch, already sitting at the table.

Since there were 3 chairs, so Zatch decided to join him.

Zeno stared at Zatch for a moment then decided to ignore him, and he started eating the mamodo size breakfast that was lay out for the twins to eat.

Apparently Xavier had already eaten an hour ago before Zeno had awakened.

There were a dozen pancakes with hot syrup in a pitcher. To top it off, there scrambled eggs, it looked like Xavier broke 2 dozen eggs, and added in some bacon inside while it was half way done.

Zatch was amazed to see the amount of delicious food lay out just for the two of them.

Zeno looked normal, since he was used to this kind of meal every morning.

"Ooohh, So much! This is for just the two of us?" Zatch asked while near drooling.

"You'll need to build your energy if you're going to train with us, Zatch" Xavier explained

"Thank you, Xavier!" Zatch thanked, then begun eating.

In the end, it turned out that Zeno had a bigger stomach then even Zatch. Since Zeno ate 2/3's of what was laid out on the table, and Zatch got full sooner than Zeno did.

"Alright…since it's your first day Zatch, how about I and Zeno both train you today?" Xavier asked.

"Wait what? Then how will I become stronger?" Zeno complained.

"I'll train you a couple days from now, since you lost a couple of your vacation days…wouldn't you like them back?" Xavier tried convincing Zeno.

Zeno thought about it while leaning the chair backwards.

"Alright, fine. But I want to start off training where I was, before all of this happened" Zeno stated then hopped off the chair and went outside.

"Umm…so how is training?" Zatch asked

"You'll be exhausted by the end of the day." Xavier told Zatch, then led the boy outside.

The 3 of them walked about 200 yards away from the house, in order to prevent damage being dealt to it.

"Ok! First up, give me 200 pushups!" Zeno ordered his younger brother. _(I can get used to this, ordering him around.) _Zeno thought, and laughed.

Zatch got on the ground and started to do pushups, Zeno took this chance to step on his back.

"Now do them" Zeno ordered his brother while standing on top of him.

"Umm…Zeno. That's not going to help Zatch right now" Xavier pointed out.

"Why not? It's making him stronger" Zeno argued

"When I meant basics, I meant Spell casting" Xavier told Zeno

Zatch was already at 20 pushups and wasn't tiring.

"I guess…that is the first thing you taught me" Zeno admitted.

"So get off of him" Xavier told Zeno

Zatch was at 30 pushups.

"Fine" Zeno said while getting off of Zatch.

Zatch got up off of the ground, and waited for Zeno and Xavier to order him around some more.

"Zatch, use the first spell "Zaker"" Zeno ordered while aiming his hand in the sky and unleashing a lightning blast that went up into the sky.

"But…I can't" Zatch stuttered

"Do it!" Zeno yelled at Zatch

"And don't look at us while trying…we don't need any burns today" Xavier reminded Zatch.

Zatch gave in and turned the opposite direction of Zeno and Xavier.

"Zaker" Zatch said.

Once again, Zatch's eye's rolled into the back of his head, and a yellowish hue started to form at Zatch's mouth.

Moments later Zatch unleashed a weak small lightning blast and fell to the ground.

Zeno of course got mad.

"Really! Put more emotion into it! Think about the people who bullied you, and use that anger! Then imagine attacking them with that anger!" Zeno told Zatch

Zatch tried to do as Zeno told him, remembering the people who bullied him…the only problem was that Zatch didn't feel angry when he thought about those people, he had no hate towards them.

"Zaker" Zatch recited.

Once again Zatch unleashed a small lightning attack, that was only slightly bigger then last time, but Zatch passed out onto the ground.

Zeno did a face palm.

"I can't!" Zatch cried out.

"Zatch, this isn't the playground. No one here will make fun of you, so don't run away." Xavier told Zatch.

"I will" Zeno retorted.

Xavier glared at Zeno.

"Don't worry Zatch, not everyone gets it perfect on their first try" Xavier stated.

"Really?" Zatch asked

"Yes, take Zeno for example" Xavier pointed at Zeno

"Me?" Zeno asked in a confused fashion.

"The first time Zeno unleashed Zaker, he slipped onto the ground and create a small pot hole in the ground" Xavier told Zatch

Zeno was embarrassed while hearing that memory of him.

"That…I did it just fine the second time!" Zeno yelled, trying to stick up for himself.

Xavier gave a good look at Zatch.

Zatch wasn't any where's near tired, yet he kept on passing out.

"Ok, how about we take a different approach." Xavier suggested.

"Like what?" Zeno and Zatch asked in unison.

"We put Zatch in a mock combat scenario" Xavier stated.

"What's that?" Zatch asked.

"You're going to fight something…" Zeno explained.

"Zeno make those scarecrows of yours, five of them" Xavier instructed

Zeno did so by pulling out about 10 strands of hair and imbuing with some of his energy.

Zeno then created 5 scarecrows/puppets.

"So Cool! More of Zeno's friends!" Zatch said in an excited fashion.

"…Oh, I guess I haven't quite explained what these things are…have I?" Zeno stated then started talking through the puppet.

"**It's just me talking through the puppet, nothing else**" One of the scarecrows's talked and spoke the same time as Zeno did.

"Oh…" Zatch said, and it looked like he understood.

"None of that matters, Zatch fight these scarecrows, and use your spells. This fight isn't over until all five of them have been destroyed." Xavier told Zatch.

"Wait, I don't want to fight them…their Zeno's" Zatch tried to explain.

"I won't give you a choice." Zeno told Zatch, Zeno begun controlling his puppets to attack Zatch.

The five puppets began circling around Zatch, and he started to become confused to what he should do.

"Throw a punch…or heck, tackle it" Xavier suggested.

(If he's not going to make a move, I might as well go first) Zeno thought then had his scarecrow's attack Zatch from behind.

Zatch was trying to run away and get into a better position since he was surrounded.

But one of the scarecrow's attacked him from behind, causing Zatch to fall to the ground.

Zatch got up pretty quickly and was nearly unhurt.

"That…didn't hurt" Zatch told Zeno and the Scarecrows.

"Oh really?" Zeno said with a evil smile

"**Look above**" One of the scarecrows announced

Zatch did so to find that one of the Scarecrows was holding a Large rock, that was slightly bigger than Zatch.

The Scarecrow dropped the rock in hopes to hit Zatch upside the head.

"AHH" Zatch yelled as he nosedived to the ground, casuing him to slide on the ground, dodging the rock that plummeted to the ground.

"Come on already Zatch, attack!" Xavier demanded

Zatch got back up on his feet and tried to pay attention to the 3 scarecrows that were in front of him.

"Maybe we should've taught him how to punch first?" Zeno mocked Zatch even more.

Zeno then had the 3 scarecrows go into a line formation and made a beeline charge towards Zatch.

In response, Zatch stood his ground and took the attack head on…even though it was weak to begin with, but it was tripled this time around.

The 3 scarecrows and Zatch met at a Stalemate, and Zatch was surprised to see that he could withstand the attack.

"Now push Zatch" Xavier told Zatch.

Zatch did so, and smashed the 3 scarecrows into the ground which cancelled them out.

"I did it!" Zatch cheered excitedly, Zatch nearly started jumping up and down but he remembered he was still in a fight.

_(Maybe I shouldn't have done a head on attack…with such a weak spell…)_ Zeno thought, than he changed his approach.

"Use Zaker" Xavier told Zatch

(But…it won't…work) Zatch thought as he still kept his eyes on one of the scarecrow's but he couldn't locate the other one.

Zatch went running after the scarecrow in front of him, but he wasn't fast enough to catch it.

_(A little, more, a little more…)_ Zeno told himself as he was laying a trap for Zatch.

Zatch kept on chasing around the scarecrow…until the scarecrow decided to stop all of a sudden, of course Zatch took this chance and tackled it to the ground as hard as he could.

The scarecrow disappeared, but before Zatch could get up, a large rock weighing about 20 pounds came crashing down on Zatch's head.

"OWW" Zatch cried out and held his head, the boulder that fell on his head slowly dropped to the ground with a soft thump.

Zatch was left with a large lump on his head, but nothing serious.

"That's what you get for not paying attention." Zeno mocked, and then pointed in the sky.

Zatch slowly looked up to see a scarecrow hovering above him.

"That means you lose Zatch" Xavier stated while walking over to the boy.

Zatch was slightly disappointed, but at the same time he had fun doing the training exercises, it felt like he was playing with against his brother Zeno.

"Can we do it again sometime?" Zatch asked in a hopeful tone.

"Well…I don't think this is the best way to bring out your spells…" Xavier responded then sat on the ground next to Zatch. _(Dang it Zatch…you were supposed to use your spells during this mock battle. It's almost like you're refusing to use your power.)_ Xavier thought then tried coming up with another solution.

"How about we have Zatch fight for someone?" Zeno asked while walking up to the two.

"To protect you mean?" Xavier responded

Zatch just sat and listened to Xavier and Zeno talk.

"Yeah, the strongest I've ever seen Zatch was when he was fighting to protect Rein" Zeno explained

Zatch became a little upset when he had to remember how Rein ended up…

Xavier started to think to how he could use Zatch's strong urge to protect to his advantage.

"Alright, I got an idea…but I don't think Zeno will like it" Xavier stated.

"Why?" Zeno asked in confusion.

1 hour later…

Xavier had built a pulley system that could lift up large boulders, and was suspended by a rope, for some reason Zeno was directly under a 300 pound boulder that was suspended 25 feet in the air.

_(This…is going to hurt)_ Zeno thought as he looked above him.

Zatch was slightly confused.

"Umm…what are we doing?" Zatch asked while looking at Xavier who was right beside him.

"You're going to destroy the boulder that is above Zeno's head…if you don't, he'll be crushed" Xavier explained

"WHAT! Zeno move out of the way!" Zatch pleaded.

"Zeno, now burn the rope that's holding the boulder" Xavier ordered

(That's like…asking me to bury my own grave…Zatch better cast that damned spell) Zeno hoped then slowly aimed his hand at the sturdy rope that was tied to the boulder.

"Zaker" Zeno casted out, Zeno's hand unleashed a small electric bolt that grazed the rope. But it was enough to catch the rope on fire.

"Zeno!" Zatch yelled, Zatch was about to dash to Zeno in order to push him out of the way. But Xavier stopped Zatch.

"Cast Zaker, and save Zeno" Xavier demanded. Xavier looked at the boulder hanging above Zeno's head. _(Maybe…I should've gotten a smaller one…)_ Xavier thought.

"Are you willing to let me get hurt?" Zeno said, trying to play along.

"Just move!" Zatch cried out.

"Teacher told me to stay right here, so I will" Zeno responded

The rope was starting to rip, and the flames on the rope were steadily increasing in size.

"Cast the first spell, use all of your emotions to bring out its power" Xavier instructed Zatch.

"It won't work!" Zatch responded

"JUST CAST IT!" Zeno screamed at Zatch.

The rope was on its last strands, and Zeno was starting to get nervous.

_(Guess I'm going to have to teleport out of the way right before it falls on top of me…)_ Zeno thought, hoping it wouldn't come to that.

The rope finally gave in and tore in half, the rock started its descent towards Zeno's head.

"ZAKER" Zatch yelled out.

A sudden buildup of energy formed at Zatch's mouth, his eye's rolled into the back of his head, yet his feet stood firm to the ground. Zatch then quickly unleashed a yellow lightning blast, which was half of the size of Zeno's normal Zaker.

The Spell met head on with the boulder, and easily destroyed it and pushed most of the debris away from Zeno.

_(Talk about last second…)_ Zeno thought and then sighed.

Zatch was starting to come back to his senses and he seen that Zeno remained unharmed and the boulder was rumble.

"Nice shot" Xavier told Zatch.

"It's only half of what it could be though…if I put full strength into my Zaker, I can make it 3 times larger than that." Zeno explained.

"But…I DID IT!" Zatch yelled excitedly. "I used a spell without passing out!" Zatch said while nearly jumping up and down.

"Well done…but your training isn't done yet, for today. We still have at least 5 hours left" Xavier told Zatch.

"Unu, thank you Xavier, Zeno" Zatch thanked both Xavier and Zeno with a smile.

"For what?" Zeno responded

Zatch found it a slightly odd question, but answered anyways.

"For teaching me" Zatch responded simply.

"Alright! Enough horsing around. Keep casting spells until you drop" Xavier ordered Zatch.

"Until I drop?" Zatch responded, not quite knowing what he meant by that.

"He means until you can't do it anymore" Zeno explained

"Oh…" Zatch responded simply.

Zatch turned away from Xavier and Zeno and started to cast his first spell…until he literally dropped to the ground exhausted. All of which, Zatch was able to cast 6 full powered Zakers until he ran out of energy.

"Now….what?" Zatch asked while laying on the ground.

"That took…about only 10 minutes…" Zeno stated_. (There's still more than 4 hours)_ Zeno thought.

Xavier looked at Zatch, "Do 200 Pushups" Xavier ordered

Zatch was already tired and his day was just getting started. "But…I'm tired" Zatch complained

"You get no breaks" Zeno responded

Xavier glared at Zeno, then looked at Zatch.

"The king isn't supervising us anymore Zeno, it'll be better for all of us if I train you both the way I want to train you" Xavier explained.

"What does that mean?" Zeno asked

"It means I'll train both of you past your limits…but I won't have you two hate me while I'm at it…" Xavier stated then looked at Zatch. "Take a 5 minute break, 5 minutes won't hurt anything." Xavier told Zatch

Zatch smiled, then relaxed a little.

"I never got a break" Zeno pouted

"Like I said, we were in the training hall…now I can do whatever the hell I want" Xavier said with a laugh.

The day went on with Xavier training Zatch, and Zeno also helping…by the end of the day, Zatch was exhausted and passed out as soon as he lay down in his bed.

…

Authors Note: Until next time, Zatch will get stronger! New people would be met.


	14. Chapter 14

Chapter 14: Neighbors

Author's note: I deleted the original chapter 14 from the FF site, for a good reason, I didn't like it. Here is its replacement.

…

"Come on Zeno, let's play" Zatch said playfully, while tugging on Zeno's hand.

Zatch and Zeno were outside, it was around 3pm, and Xavier had given Zatch and Zeno a "recess" from training.

Zeno instinctively yanked his hand out of his brother's grip. Zeno then started to walk away, "I don't want to play" Zeno stated. He started to walk towards the house, where Xavier was…resting.

"No, please, please, please" Zatch begged, as he ran to cut Zeno's path.

"This recess thing Xavier created is retarded. What could I possibly gain from playing?" Zeno questioned, as he started pushing Zatch backwards, into the direction of the house.

"Huh? We get to have fun, we can play explorer. Come on Zeno, please!" Zatch responded, now dragging across the ground, while holding onto Zeno's feet.

"Let go!" Zeno yelled, as it felt he was now trudging through mud, but it was only Zatch restricting his movements.

"Why do you always like training? It gets boring after a while" Zatch asked, while still holding onto Zeno's feet.

Zeno tried shaking his legs hard enough, that Zatch would let go, but it didn't work. "It's because…" Zeno stopped for a second. _(It's all I'm used to doing…)_ Zeno thought as he looked down at his brother. "I want to become stronger" Zeno stated, as he grabbed Zatch's hands, forced Zatch to let him go.

"See you're already the strongest person I know, so let's go play" Zatch asked again, while still holding onto his brother's hands, hoping to hear a "yes".

Zeno back away a few feet from his brother. "You only think that, because you don't know many strong people" Zeno responded. "You should be training with me, you only know two spells" Zeno responded, now trying to get Zatch to train even more today.

"Is that the only way we can spend time together?" Zatch asked in a near depressed mood.

"Yes" Zeno replied, then walked back into the house, with Zatch trudging his feet along behind his brother, in defeat.

Inside the house, the first room, was the dining room, where Xavier was at the table drinking something, Zeno didn't know what.

"What do you two want?" Xavier asked, as he still kept on drinking his mystery drink, which looked dark green, and steam was coming off the top of it.

"I want to skip recess, and start training" Zeno told his instructor.

"No" Xavier responded, with almost no hesitation behind his answer.

"What? Why not?" Zeno asked in a slightly angered tone

"Well I want to enjoy this recess myself. So go play…that's an order" Xavier explained, while still drinking his mystery tea.

Zeno growled at that statement, "Damn it" Zeno mumbled as he glanced at Zatch, already knowing what Zatch's response would be.

Zatch's eyes lit up like a Christmas tree, as he grabbed his brother by his right arm, and tugged on it. "See, now let's go play explorer" Zatch insisted.

_(But I don't want to!)_ Zeno wanted to yell out loud. Zeno then imagined himself shooting out a very small Zakeru that would hit his instructor's cup, and spilling the hot tea into his lap…which would surely end recess time. Zeno then snapped out of his daydream, to find himself already outside, and following Zatch into the nearby woods, which surrounded their home. _(How the heck?!) _Zeno thought to himself, as he was now confused to how he let himself fall into this situation.

Zatch went by a dead tree, and broke off a small, almost straight branch. Zatch then handed the stick to Zeno.

"What's this for?" Zeno asked. _(If I'm going to be forced to play…then I may as well know what's going on…for I don't make a fool of myself) _Zeno thought.

"It's your tool, for getting through this huge forest" Zatch explained.

Zeno looked in front of him, the forest was dense, but they could simply walk around the bushes and trees, etc. There was even a small trail they could use.

"Couldn't I use Zakeru, to clear a better path?" Zeno asked, as it felt like more work to hit every leaf stick, bush, etc.

"Where's the fun in that?" Zatch responded. Zatch then purposely left the trail, and went trudging through the weeds, and bushes, while crouching down, almost as to hid himself.

_(He's practically playing in the dirt)_ Zeno thought, as he didn't see the appeal in getting his white cloak dirty.

A couple birds were seen flying out of the bushes, whenever Zatch got too close. The birds were pretty small, and they looked like blue jays.

"Look at all the pretty birds!" Zatch yelled, when he was able to see about 10 of them flying away from him. "Let's see who can find more birds" Zatch stated, as he started a bird hunt.

_(I rather not)_ Zeno thought as he followed behind Zatch.

"I found 4 more" Zatch pointed out, as he climbed next to a tree, only to see them fly away from him again.

_(I feel like I'm babysitting)_ Zeno sighed, as he crossed his arms, and leaned next to a tree.

Zatch repeated the process, of getting next to the birds, and trying to count every individual one, before he got to close and they flew away, he did this for roughly 5 minutes.

"Zeno I counted up to 20!" Zatch yelled out as he climbed down the tree.

"So?" Zeno responded, as he was still in the same spot.

"How many did you count?" Zatch asked.

"None, this game is stupid" Zeno stated, as he actually had his eyes closed, for he wouldn't even partake in the bird watching.

"So…that just means I'm winning" Zatch responded with a smile.

"What?" Zeno said, as he then glared at Zatch.

"I'm winning, it's 20 to 0" Zatch stated, as he then continued to search for more birds.

_(I'm losing? I won't lose to Zatch in any sort of competition)_ Zeno thought as he raised his hand in the air. "Zakeru" Zeno yelled out, as he unleashed a medium size lightning bolt into the air, which made a large booming noise.

"Huh?" Zatch was surprised to hear a large booming sound come from behind him, which caused him to jump and look at Zeno.

The sound was loud enough to shake the forest, and more than one hundred birds had flown away in freight.

Zeno focused his attention on the flock of birds running away at his power.

"Zeno why did you do that?!" Zatch yelled at his brother, as it did surprise him too.

"…" Zeno didn't respond, as he was silently counting to himself.

"Zeno?"

"I count 126 birds" Zeno stated, then pointed at Zatch. "Beat that" Zeno said, with a victorious grin.

"Unu, no fair Zeno, you cheated!" Zatch whined, and wanted to pout, but didn't. Instead, for some reason, Zatch let out a smile. "Well, at least you're playing with me now" Zatch said, as he went and grabbed Zeno by the arm. "Come on let's play some more" Zatch requested.

_(Damn it…there's no point in winning, if the loser doesn't care…If he lost)_ Zeno thought.

…

"What should we play next?" Zatch asked, as they got into an open grass field.

"How about we just take a nap…" Zeno suggested as he sat down on the grass. _(We have around 2 hours left…why is this recess so long?)_ Zeno wondered.

"But I'm not tired…You don't look tired either Zeno" Zatch responded, as he went to grab his brother's hand, to lift him to his feet.

Zeno stood up before Zatch could even get close. "You'll just keep bothering me, unless I play with you...Won't you" Zeno growled.

Zatch poked Zeno's chest, then ran away from the silver haired boy, as fast as he could.

_(What the?)_ Zeno thought, as he was wondering why Zatch had just randomly poked him, and then ran away, as if his life depended on it.

"Tag, you're it" Zatch yelled out, as he was already 100 feet away from his brother.

Zeno just stood there, not knowing what to do. With an utter look of confusion, "What the heck are you talking about?" Zeno asked.

"Unu, you're it…You have to catch me. Then I'll be 'it', so I'll have to tag you back" Zatch tried explaining, while yelling it out, since he was pretty far away from his brother.

"So that's 'Tag', huh" Zeno sighed, then started to slowly walk towards Zatch.

Zatch of course increased the distance between him and Zeno, even more.

_(Such an easy game)_ Zeno thought, as he made a mad dash towards Zatch. Within just a split second, the large amount of distance Zatch gained was quickly lost, as Zeno was only mere inches away from being able to tag him.

"AHH!" Zatch yelled as he stopped his slow pace of running, and started running as fast as he could.

Zeno was about to tag his brother, until he stopped, and slowed his pace down, to meet his brother's speed.

_(If I finish the game too quickly, Zatch will just find another game to play…Maybe I should just make him run till he drops…then he'll want to take a nap.) _Zeno thought, as he ran just a few feet behind Zatch.

Zatch let out a loud yell, as he tried to increase his speed even further. Sweat was already running down the boy's face, as he knew Zeno was right behind him.

_(He's trying really hard…to get away)_ Zeno thought, as he started to laugh a little. Around 30 minutes past, with Zatch running at top speed the entire time, he even tried running through the forest, jumping over logs, running through bushes, anything to try and gain distance between him and Zeno…of course it didn't work.

"You….won't…catch me!" Zatch yelled out, as a red blush was showing in his cheeks, and his breathing started becoming very heavy.

For some reason, seeing Zatch struggle so hard to get away, yet knowing he could end the chase at any time he chose, made it very entertaining. Zeno even laughed at the moments when Zatch would dive into a hollow log, and believe he was safe, just to find that Zeno simply walked on top of the log, and waited on the other side for him. Even now, the chase was becoming so long, that Zeno couldn't help but laugh.

"I'm going…get you, Zatch" Zeno said between laughter. Zeno tried suppressing his laughter, since he found out that if he laughed too hard, that it actually became harder to run fast. If Zeno laughed too much, he found that Zatch could gain some ground…of course Zeno could catch up very soon after.

Finally the twins ran out of the woods again, to find themselves next to a large beach, with a brown sandy shoreline.

"Zatch where are we?" Zeno asked, as it finally dawned on him, that he lost track of where he was going. Zeno stopped for a moment, to observe where he was. "Uhh…." Zeno mumbled, as he was actually lost. _(Shit, how could I lose which direction I went in? I was so focused on keeping up with Zatch…that I got lost!)_ Zeno thought as he wanted to retrace his steps. "Zatch come on, we got to go" Zeno stated, then looked back at Zatch, to see that he had stripped off his clothes, and dived into the water, and he was already about 30 feet out.

"I bet I can swim faster than you Zeno" Zatch yelled out, as he waved his hand in the air.

"Why did you get naked?!" Zeno retorted. _(Idiot still thinks we're playing tag)_ Zeno thought as he let out a sigh. "Get out of the water" Zeno ordered.

"If I do, I'll get tagged" Zatch stated.

"The game is over, get back here" Zeno said in a demanding voice.

"So I win?" Zatch asked.

"What? No I won" Zeno retorted, not wanting to admit defeat to his younger brother.

"But you never tagged me" Zatch said in a teasing manner.

"Then get your naked self out of the water for I can end this!" Zeno shouted out.

"I don't want to" Zatch responded, as he gained a little bit more distance from the shore.

"Damn it" Zeno growled as he turned around, and was about to walk away…but even though it was a game, Zeno still refused to let Zatch beat him in anything.

Moments later Zeno took off nearly all of his clothes, except for his boxers.

"I'm going to finish this stupid game" Zeno stated as he dove into the water, and started to swim after his brother.

"Ah!" Zatch yelled, as he was surprised that Zeno had given chase. Zatch quickly turned away from the shoreline, as he swam away from his brother.

Soon enough though, Zeno found out that he couldn't keep up with his brother in this pursuit. This chase didn't last nearly as long, as the one in the woods. Since Zeno didn't find it amusing that he was losing horribly to his younger brother.

"You can't catch me" Zatch said and giggled, as he kept a solid distance of 50 feet between him and his brother.

_(Shit…I can't even believe I still remember how to swim)_ Zeno thought in dismay, as he knew he was far too slow in the water to keep up with Zatch. With that in mind, Zeno swam back to the beach, in defeat.

"Wait! Zeno are you done playing?" Zatch asked, as he started to swim towards Zeno.

"I guess…there's something you are better than me at" Zeno responded, as he finally reached the beach, and laid down on the sand.

Zatch was out of the water, soon after Zeno. "You want to play a different game?" Zatch asked, as he put on Zeno's white cloak. He only did that out of convenience, because it was close to him.

Zeno in response jumped up, and ran at Zatch, "Take off my clothes!" Zeno shouted.

"Ah!" Zatch yelled and started to run away from his brother. "I thought you were done playing!"

"I'm not playing you fool! Give me back my clothes!" Zeno yelled, as he quickly tackled Zatch to the ground, about 5 seconds later after the chase even started. Unfortunately Zeno had tackled Zatch down a small hill.

Both Zatch and Zeno tumbled about 5 feet, until they hit somebody near the end of the hill.

"Watch were you're going!" the person shouted out.

Zeno took this moment, to snatch back his own clothes from his brother, as Zatch laid on the ground in a slight daze.

After striping his brother naked, Zeno finally got a chance to look at the person they had accidently crashed into.

This person was already standing up on her feet. The child was around the age of 5 or 6, as she was only slightly taller than Zeno. She had aqua blue hair, with two long ponytails extending upwards into the air, which was tied off by golden tiara bands on the top, and a pink ribbon that kept the hairstyle together at the bottom. Plus another gold tiara that was placed on her head, like some princess or royalty. She had pretty blue eyes, she had the complexion of a Caucasian child, and for some reason her cheeks were turning bright red. She was wearing a 3 color tone dress that went down to her shins; it also had a giant pink heart that covered most of her chest. Lastly she had a gold wristband on her left arm, and was wearing pink shoes.

_(Her energy is quite weak…)_ Zeno thought, as that was the only thing on his mind…if he had to fight her or not. Zeno nonchalantly got back up and put his mantle back on.

"Ouch…Zeno, you didn't have to tackle me." Zatch cried, as he got up and noticed that there was someone he didn't know, still staring at him.

"No tag backs" Zeno responded with a small grin, and then glared back at the unknown child who was starting to weird him out a little.

"Wha…what are you doing on my beach?" the child asked, in a stuttering voice, as she couldn't help but keep staring at Zatch. The

Zeno growled a bit, "Mind your own business" Zeno replied, as he started to walk away, and towards where Zatch last put his clothes. "Come on Zatch, we're leaving" Zeno demanded.

"Unu, coming Zeno" Zatch said, then turned his back towards the child.

"Yo…You're just going to leave… without apologizing for crashing into me?" The child asked, while still not being able to talk without stuttering her words first.

"Opps, sorry for hurting you, umm..." Zatch said, as he turned around and looked at her, with a confused look.

"Who are you?"

"Ah…Ah!" the girl tried to speak her name but couldn't. Her heart felt like it was beating out of her chest. _(Penny! Penny! Damn it just say my name)_ Penny thought as she tried, but failed horribly, as whatever she said came out in gibberish.

Suddenly Zatch's boxers and mantle was thrown at him by Zeno. "I said we're leaving" Zeno stated, as he started to walk away from his brother again.

Zatch quickly put his clothes back on, and then looked at the girl. "Goodbye" Zatch said, as he quickly ran after his brother.

_(Is this what they call love at first sight?)_ Penny thought, as she soon became devastated that she couldn't interact with the child, or even tell him her name. The twin boys were soon out of her sight.

…

"Can't we play any longer Zeno?" Zatch whined, as he was trudging along behind his brother.

"Why? I beat you in every game" Zeno stated, then stopped in the middle of the woods to get try and figure out which direction he should go.

"Yeah, but this is the first time played together, and both of us had fun" Zatch said with an earnest smile.

_(It…Is true? I had fun playing kid games…)_ Zeno thought to himself, then turned away from Zatch. "It was a waste of my time, plus this 'recess' is over. We're going home" Zeno stated, then stretched out his mantle, and had it wrap around both him and Zatch.

"What are you doing?"

Penny was also confused to what the pale skinned child was doing…mostly because she wanted to keep following them.

Soon that question was answered as Zeno teleported himself back to the house, where Xavier's energy could still be felt inside the house.

"NO!" Penny cried out, as her beloved completely vanished from sight.

…

"Xavier, we're back home" Zeno announced as he and Zatch came walking back in through the front door.

Xavier's face perked up a bit, _(Did he just call me by name?) _Xavier thought, as this was the first time it happened. "Umm…did something happen, Zeno?" Xavier asked, only to have Zatch jump into his lap, and Zatch started talking about his small adventure with Zeno.

Zeno didn't answer the question given to him, and since it was now around 5pm. So the boy decided to go to his room, and read a book and wait until dinner was done.

…

Authors Note: This actually turned out a lot different than planned…dang, this is like my third idea for chapter 14…Yes I'm still alive and kicking.


End file.
